Tooth and Nail: A Novel Approach to the New SAT [Paperback]

Charles Harrington Elster (Author), Joseph Elliot (Author)

Book Description

Series: A Harvest Test Preparation Book | Publication Date: January 12, 1994

An SAT vocabulary-building program in the lively form of a mystery novel. Now students who take the Scholastic Assessment Test can learn more than 1,200 SAT words, improve reading comprehension, and enjoy a good story all at the same time. Includes exercises, glossary with page references.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Abate, abhor, abject, abridge, abstemious ... still awake? Good, because now there's a better way to learn all those words than plowing through those never-ending vocabulary lists devised by torture experts. Tooth and Nail: A Novel Approach to the New SAT is just what it says it is: a guide to the big, bad SAT words in the form of a mystery novel. Follow Caitlin and Phil's exploits as they wend their way through their first year of college and find intrigue behind the curtain of academia. As you do, you'll find a few words in boldface, each of which is defined and compared with other words in a glossary in the back of the book. Seeing the word in its context and immediately finding a definition is a much more satisfying way to learn than just to read word after unconnected word--you might as well read the dictionary! A preface explains in greater detail how best to use the book, and there are helpful SAT-style exercises in antonyms, analogies, and comprehension, so this makes a great all-around verbal package for the serious test-taker. If you must take the test, you might as well have a little fun doing it, and by the time you've finished Tooth and Nail, you'll be glad it doesn't end as a list: "...wizened, wreak, writhe, zeal, zealous." --Rob Lightner

Review

Abate, abhor, abject, abridge, abstemious ... still awake? Good, because now there's a better way to learn all those words than plowing through those never-ending vocabulary lists devised by torture experts. Tooth and Nail: A Novel Approach to the New SAT is just what it says it is: a guide to the big, bad SAT words in the form of a mystery novel. Follow Caitlin and Phil's exploits as they wend their way through their first year of college and find intrigue behind the curtain of academia. As you do, you'll find a few words in boldface, each of which is defined and compared with other words in a glossary in the back of the book. Seeing the word in its context and immediately finding a definition is a much more satisfying way to learn than just to read word after unconnected word--you might as well read the dictionary! A preface explains in greater detail how best to use the book, and there are helpful SAT-style exercises in antonyms, analogies, and comprehension, so this makes a great all-around verbal package for the serious test-taker. If you must take the test, you might as well have a little fun doing it, and by the time you've finished Tooth and Nail, you'll be glad it doesn't end as a list: "...wizened, wreak, writhe, zeal, zealous." (Amazon.com Review - Rob Lightner )

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 14 and up
  
• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Mariner Books; 1 edition (January 12, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0156013827
• ISBN-13: 978-0156013826
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (32 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #35,036 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #68 in Books > Education & Reference > Education > Test Guides - College & University > SAT & PSAT
  • #91 in Books > Teens > Mysteries

More About the Author

Charles Harrington Elster is a writer, broadcaster, and logophile--a lover of words.

He is the author of the popular vocabulary-building program "Verbal Advantage." His other books include "Tooth and Nail" and "Test of Time," vocabulary-building novels for high school students preparing to take the college entrance exams; "There's a Word for It," a lighthearted look at unusual--and unusually useful--words; "What in the Word?" a salmagundi of word lore, wordplay, and advice on usage and pronunciation; and "The Big Book of Beastly Mispronunciations," now in its second edition, which the late William Safire of The New York Times hailed as "the best survey of the spoken field in years."

Charlie's latest book, "The Accidents of Style: Good Advice on How Not to Write Badly," was published in July 2010 by St. Martin's Griffin. He is currently writing a vocabulary-building companion to "Verbal Advantage" called "Word Workout."

Charlie was a consultant for "Garner's Modern American Usage." He is the pronunciation editor of "Black's Law Dictionary" and The Orthoepist (pronunciation expert) for Wordnik.com, an online dictionary project. He has been a guest contributor to the "On Language" column of The New York Times Magazine, and his articles have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, the Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times, the San Diego Union-Tribune, and other publications.

Charlie has also been talking about language on the radio since 1985. He has been interviewed on NPR's "Talk of the Nation," "Weekend Edition," and "All Things Considered" and been a guest on hundreds of radio shows around the country. For five and a half years he cohosted a weekly public radio talk show on language called "A Way with Words."

Charlie was born in New York City in 1957 and earned his B.A. cum laude from Yale in 1981. He lives in San Diego with his wife and two daughters.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

30 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great SAT preparation, ok story, December 5, 1999

By 

Jesse Ruderman - See all my reviews

This review is from: Tooth and Nail: A Novel Approach to the New SAT (Paperback)

Tooth and Nail is a fun mystery story that contains many SAT-level words in boldface and has a glossary in the back. I found this to be an effective way of increasing my vocabulary, because I got to see each word used in context. In combination with studying word roots (etymology), reading this book helped me increase my SAT I verbal score about 170 points. Why aren't there more SAT preparation books like this?

The story itself is about two incoming college freshmen who gradually find out that strange things are going on around the campus. It's not the most enjoyable story, but it is interesting and relevant to people who are preparing for the SAT (and, as others have said, a whole lot more fun than memorizing word lists).

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Learning words in context is the best approach, April 8, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Tooth and Nail: A Novel Approach to the New SAT (Paperback)

Learning words in context is a great idea. It's the only method that works. This book was released in 1994 and for several years was the only one of its kind. But there are three new additions in this format--from Barrons, Kaplan, and A. J. Cornell Publications. Some people have complained that with this book it's problematic to have all the words at the back, in a glossary--because you have to keep stopping to find them back there. I agree with that. At least one of the above-mentioned books--The Wizard of Oz Vocabulary Builder--places the definitions on the same page as the words, and it seems to work well. Perhaps the next edition of this book can be reformatted that way.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars OK, But not worth your studying time, January 31, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Tooth and Nail: A Novel Approach to the New SAT (Paperback)

While I found the story in this book quite interesting, I do not think that it significantly improved my vocabulary. By using an "SAT Word" once in the book, I did not learn that word. The same words should have been repeated more than once, when possible. Perhaps, as another review suggested, the definitions should appear at the bottom of the page and not in the back - constantly flipping to the glossary was detrimental to my reading experience. I would not reccomend buying this book to learn vocabulary words, although I think the approach has some merit.