Customer Reviews

Barron's How to Prepare for the Gre Graduate Record Examination (Barron's How to Prepare for the Gre Test (Book and CD-Rom), 14th ed)

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I used this book (not the CD), the Princeton Cracking the GRE, and the ETS Powerprep software. I have to say this book was the most helpful to get my scores (V 730, Q 790, A 800). I only really studied the Verbal part, and the 3500 word list in this book was exceptional (and needed for the test). I also liked the large number of questions after each section that you could practice on.

For each section of the GRE, and type of question in each section, Barron's gives you tactics to answer each question effectively. I felt those tactics did help me, on all sections. Especially on the math section, which had a whole chapter which reviewed, point by point, each math concept which you could be expected to know. That geometry is always a pain! :)

I didn't miss the CD, and one word of caution, don't take the Diagnostic Test too seriously, just practice alot and get familiar with questions and strategies to deal with them. That will help more, because you are probably more aware of your weak areas than the test can show you.

I recommend this book, not necessarily for it's tests, but for the abundance of study material, and for practice questions at the end of each section to review what you just learned. Also for the LARGE vocab list (love those notecards).

As I've mentioned in other GRE preparatory material reviews I've written, I used four resources from four different publishers to prepare for my GRE. In the end, three only proved useful. To that end, Barron's was useful primarily for one reason - the 3500-word vocabulary list. It is broken down into 50 lessons, each of which contains an average of 70 words. The definitions are clear and concise and the lesson quizzes at the end of each section are helpful in reinforcing your knowledge. As it turns out, I studied the list religiously, eventually learning literally every single word in the list (I knew about 60% of the words before starting out). Because of the list and my fervent dedication to learning it, the Verbal portion of my GRE was demonstrably easier (or more difficult, actually, because of the computer-adaptive nature of the test). In any event, I am certain my Verbal score was enhanced as a direct result of studying the list. I trust you will find the same. Good luck!

I just finished taking the GRE earlier today and although I did ok, I can not say had a pleasant time studying for it using this book. While the book does have 4 complete tests and goes through all of the major tactics, it has too many errors in it for a book published under the Barron's name. On numorous practice problems there were typos which just enraged me because I thought I had gotten a problem wrong and could not comprehend their reason until I noticed that their explanation was for choice C instead of D. Also in the math and analytical sections, the book presents problems that are very ambiguous, or contain incomplete information in order to solve the problem, and then the explanation uses one of those missing facts in order to justify their answer. Many of the math and analytical problems were unsolvable without the missing information, and made a real test situation very hard to attain with their examples. I was accepting of the first couple of typos, but after experiencing a couple of typos per practice test section, I have become very upset with the overall quality of this book. If all you intend to do is read the tactics and vocabulary list, then this book is just fine, but if you really want to be prepared for the GRE and actually do practice problems, this book is the one to STAY AWAY from. I am so upset right now, I almost want to go and write Barron's a letter of complaint, but I think all they would do is throw my comments with the rest of the trash. But if I write this review, I can help people choose a much more appropriate book, such as any other GRE prep book.

There, I'm done ranting. People, please avoid this book if you intend on using the practice problems. Spend the extra money and buy that software package from ETS with real problems. I should have done that if I wasn't so cheap. D'oh!

Let's just start by saying that I never used a test prep book of any kind that was more helpful---and I've used plenty: for both the PSAT and SAT, for AP courses, NYS Regents exams, etc. The best parts for me were the math---because everything was explained so clearly, and I was never very good at math--- and the analytical reasoning--because I had never seen questions like that before, and I found them intimidating. The practice analytical questions were just like what I saw on the real test, and I got most of them right!

I can't contradict any other review, but I didn't find a single error in the math section---maybe because my book was the fourth printing and the typos from the first printing were already corrected. In any event, what was even more helpful than the math review were the math tactics, which enabled me to answer correctly several questions for which I was clueless at to the correct mathematical solution. That was amazing.

I also found the vocabulary section good, but I spent less time on that, since that wasn't my problem area.

Good luck to anyone taking the test. I honestly think this book will help you.

I studied for 2 months for the GRE's and tried out lots of books. This one was the best. (I used the 15th edition which is bit more recent). The math review was the most comprehensive I found, and I needed a great deal of math review because I've been out of school 15 years and haven't taken a math course in 19 years. The vocabulary lists were terrific too. Unlike some other reviewers, I found the practice questions to be about the same, and in some cases a bit easier, than the actual test. But I scored higher than I'd expected to on both the math and verbal sections, largely due to this book. My one complaint was there there is no index listing where to find help with specific math concepts so I had to do a lot of flipping around to find particular sections. I'd say: leave yourself plenty of time to study, try several books out to get different tactics (such as Cracking the GRE, the GRE for Dummies, the Kaplan's GRE Prep) but use this book extensively and definitely, definitely, definitely work with the GRE Powerprep software offered by the ETS, the people who make up the real GRE. I'd recommend downloading it from the web site because, although you're supposed to receive it in the mail once you register for the GRE's, it may not arrive in time. Best of luck!

I think this is a very useful tool to prepare for the GRE. What I like about this book is that, it gives you a lot of strategies on how to prepare for the verbal, quantitative and analytical part. If you plan to study extensively for the test, you should get this book too. Besides giving you strategies, they have plenty of exercises that you can practice and also one of their main feature is the 3,500 words that are commonly tested throughout the years. In addition to that, if you have fears on the math part, they run you through possible questions and how to answer it. At the end, I think they have 3 sample tests which you can practice on. What I like best about this book is that, for instance, when I practice some of the exam questions, and if I get em' wrong which happens very often, I can look up the answer and they even tell you where to refer to in their chapters solutions for that kind of question.

The math review of this book is a tremendous help to revise basic and important math concepts. It has given important formulae in bullet points with very instructive excercises. This is important for the people who are out of touch with this level of math. The vocabulary list is an essential for anyone serious about increasing their verbal score (unless your verbal skills are already phenomenal).

The only drawback is that the full-length tests are not indicative of the actual CAT test questions and expected scores.

Overall a book necessary to go through before you are gruelled by ETS!

This Barron's guide to the GRE probably has equivalent information and study tips to the other GRE guides that are available, making it an acceptable guide. This especially applies to the Verbal Ability section and the diagnostic and model tests. The 3500-word dictionary of brainiac words is also useful but takes forever to get through if you tackle it from a study angle. The biggest problem with this guide is the Quantitative (math) Ability section, in which complex solutions are difficult to read and sometimes contain errors and typos. Take this example: "x+.25x=1.25x=2000=>y=2000/.75=2666.67." Now imagine that crammed into the middle of a paragraph containing various fonts and typefaces - and this example doesn't even contain square roots, exponents, fractions, or other hard to read symbols. Add to that some flat-out errors (see some of the other reviews here for examples) and the Quantitative section presents some difficulties. The Analytical Ability section falters in some places as it tries to explain how you should "infer" or "deduce" answers. I found myself just plain disagreeing with some of the answers in the Analytical section, with no explanation as to why I should agree with the guide's answer. One final humbug in this edition is the 2-page synopsis on the new Analytical Writing portion of the test, which is hidden at the end of the book after about 140 pages of model test information.

This guide will surely help you practice adequately for the GRE, but the presentation leaves a little to be desired. Also, you can buy this book with the optional CD-ROM, which gives tips on the current computer-based version of the test. If you have at least competent computer skills, the CD-ROM is unnecessary, so skip it and save some money.

The good thing about this book is the 3500 word list. The questions are pretty tough and is good if you are aiming for high scores (i.e. in the 700s). Good Luck! The questions may get a little too hard. And for specific strategies, I think the Kaplan book + CDROM is a better choice.

Hi!

The review section is excellent, and the explanation of the test format was exactly what I needed. I not only worked on the CD-ROM (which by the way, the GRE is computer-based anyway), but on the paper-based exams. Both helped. I highly recommend this book!