Customer Reviews

1,014 GRE Practice Questions (Graduate School Test Preparation)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(21)

 

 

The intentions behind this book are very good. Sections are well laid out, and there are explanations for every answer.

BUT (and that's a big but)

There are ERRORS ABOUND! The math section is especially egregious.
1. The answers are marked with one choice, then in the explanation a completely different choice is stated correct.
2. The answer doesn't correlate to the correct question (ie the explanation explains a completely different question)
3. The answer is completely wrong.
4. The question is lacking a salient piece of information necessary to solve.
5. the typesetting is off and therefore angles are mislabeled.
6. etc and so on.

One would think that the princeton review could afford a better editor. Seriously, I'm only making one pass of this book and I've found better than 50 errors in this book. Math is my specialty, so who knows how many errors there are in the verbal section? If you're not good at math, how will you even know if you've made mistakes or not?

BTW, I did find a correction list for this book at [...] Liked the fact that this book was grouped by subject matter--made it easier to focus on what I needed. Also appreciated the assessment tests at the beginning--pointed out some weak spots I didn't know I had!! The explanations were detailed and fairly easy to follow. Plus found that this book gave me enough practice--I'm a little bit of a freak about being prepared (smile). Overall, with the correction list, thought this was a good resource...

This book provides an adequate review of GRE materials. There are more than enough questions to give you practice and it provides questions on every topic ranging from the very easy to the very difficult.

There are two primary drawbacks to using this book. (1) As the other review notes, there are a lot of errors in this book, and Princeton Review doesn't provide corrections (that I know of... I've looked). How many errors are there, you ask? There were a lot in the beginning of the math section, but then they decreased (I think... you never know really), towards the end. There are enough to irritate you.(2) The other problem is that there is only 1 "full-length" (which is not full length) practice test. You would probably want to use this book simultaneously with real GRE practice tests if you can to simulate the real thing.

In sum, this book has been helpful despite the errors, and I don't know of any other book similar to this where there are just LOTS of practice questions.

I bought the book despite the review about errors, since someone provided the link to Princeton with the correction sheet. However, when I looked up the errors in the copy I recently received, they had already been corrected. So it appears that the most recent version being sent out is more up to date than previous versions. Good news.

Yes the reviewers are correct about the egregious plethora of errors. But don't let that disuade you from utilizing this book. The 6 pages of 112 corrections (about a 10% error rate for those who are studying)is available on Princeton Review's web site see: [...]
If amazon removes the hyperlink just do a google search for "princeton review 1014 errata" and it should be one of the first few options.
With these 6 pages of corrections this is still a great source of GRE questions arranged, helpfully, according to subject and question type. If purchased together with their Cracking the GRE you have a great pairing to improve your aggregate GRE score. Hopefully next years edition of this book will have seen greater scrutiny, but since this doesn't help anyone now I only give it 3 stars.

Everyone has already shed plenty of light on the fact that this book has tons of errors, and it does.

However, I still think that it is a great resource. I couldn't find any other book that offered so many practice questions. Other books had ~500 questions. If you want to prepare by just drilling practice questions (which is what I wanted), this is the best choice out there.

The book is broken down into sections which was particularly useful in the math section. There are 36 questions just on Circles! That pretty much covers every concept about circles that the GRE will test. Also, this book had some tips and tricks that were not in Princeton Review's Cracking the GRE.

I took a diagnostic test before I studied. I used this book along with Cracking the GRE 2010 and the Kaplan Vocabulary flashcards to study and when I was done, I scored significantly better. I also scored high on the real GRE. In all, this book does have a tons of errors, but I do think that it was a valuable study tool that did help to raise my score.

The errors in this book are ridiculous. I don't see how it ever got published in the state its in. Do not waste your money!

I am pleased to see that I am not the only person who complains about how riddled this book is with mistakes. DO NOT purchase this book, unless of course, instead of studying for the GRE's you would like to learn how to become an editor.

Here is just one, of many examples, of flagrant mistakes made in the book:

pg. 66

Question 12 of 20

Grief: Keen

a. glee: chortle
b. jejune: blanch
c. elongated: yawn
d. genteel: fumble
e: ingenuous: deceive

listed correct answer: A

explanation on pg. 89

Make a defining sentence: Keen means to express grief [...] The best answer is choice (A) because RECOIL is what someone does in a GHASTLY stiuation

Very frustrating. Not worth valuable study time distinguishing when you are wrong, and when the book is wrong.

Do not buy this book. It is riddled with errors. GRE math is confusing enough when the answers match the questions. The Princeton Review is making far too much money to let a heinous mistake like this book go to print. Do yourself a favor. Look elsewhere.

Many reviewers have remarked on the number of errors this book has in its math sections, and while those errors are certainly annoying, I believe that the verbal sections are even worse. Many of the questions and answers in this book were, in my opinion, poorly designed. Frequently, the verbal questions in this book have two or three answers that sort of fit, but none that really stand out as the correct answer. Therefore, choosing one answer over the other often comes down to splitting hairs, and many of the explanations they give for the "correct" answers seemed totally arbitrary.

Some of the questions were just flat-out unfair. Look at this antonyms question:

RIPE:
A) antediluvian
B) inchoate
C) indefatigable
D) emergent
E) infelicitous

According to the book, "ripe" means NOT fully-formed, so the solution is (B), because a secondary definition of "inchoate" is fully-formed. That's funny because most dictionaries define ripe as meaning fully-formed and don't even include that secondary definition of "inchoate". I didn't know "inchoate" had a secondary meaning that was the exact opposite of its primary definition. Did you?

Here is another antonyms question:

OBDURATE:
A) caustic
B) tractable
C) obsequious
D) recalcitrant
E) onerous

Here, both (B) and (C) seem like solutions. The correct solution, according to the book, is (B) "tractable" because "obsequious", like "obdurate", has a negative connotation.

I've only highlighted two examples from the antonyms section, but the rest of the verbal sections are equally bad, if not worse. The day before I took the GRE, I tried doing some of these drills and found that I routinely missed 25% to 40% of the questions. Yet, on the real exam, I got a 780 verbal score. The real GRE felt easy by comparison because the correct solution was always clear and unambiguous.

The math sections may be riddled with errors, but I found them more useful than the verbal sections. Overall, this book is not entirely useless, but it should be used with a great deal of caution.