In most cases the best way do do this is to book a plane ticket and a hotel room, then apply for a visa and include the details of your planned travel in the visa application. It helps on a visa application to look like a "normal" tourist — "I am coming for a week and will be staying at [xxx]".
(I learned from a prior FlyerTalk thread that when applying for a visa in some countries, it is much easier to say "here is my hotel reservation, I am staying at [xxx]" — if you say "I am planning to stay with [xxx family member]" they will telephone that person to confirm and will interrogate you to make sure you do not intend to overstay your visa and permanently move in with that family member. This behavior apparently mirrors how the US treats foreign tourist visa applicants.)
For a Chinese visa, if you're a US citizen applying from within the US, it should be no problem to get a multiple-entry tourist visa. Expect to have to mail your passport away to an application center and expect a couple of weeks processing time during which you will be passport-less.
The Chinese visa process is a bit pricey but not particularly difficult.
Originally Posted by
catocony
It looks like China requires a hotel and airline reservation to get a visa. What I've done in similar circumstances is to book a flight, print out the receipt, then cancel. The same for a hotel reservation.
As long as you're not applying for a visa that you need in a hurry, you can book your flight anytime you want. Just make sure that, whatever visa you get, that it doesn't have a requirement to enter within a short period of time. A lot of countries require your first entry to be within a certain period of time - 90 days, six months, whatever. If you don't enter by then, the visa is invalid.
This is probably fine but a slightly less risky way to do this is to book a refundable ticket (a pricey fare or a frequent-flyer ticket if you're an elite member and get free milage redeposits), then, after the visa is issued and you get your passport back, refund the ticket and book a cheaper nonrefundable ticket. This stands up to inspection if someone asks if the flight is still active and it's not "wrong" — you planned to take flights X, your plans changed once you had more solid info.