Vicious Vocabulary [Large Print] [Paperback]

Phil Eisenhower (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 9, 2003

Timorous tenderfoots, lackadaisical slouches, and closed-minded obscurants should avoid this fun and devious vocabulary book. Everyone else will delight in its blend of flabbergasting words, wacky quotes, and creative quizzes. Educator Phil Eisenhower has selected the words SAT and GRE takers love to hate–
such as obdurate, edacious, and vulpine–and made them memorable. Realizing that people remember insults better than any other words, the author has phrased each word as a humorous barb. The result is a vocabulary reference that everyone–from gangsters to students to presidents–can use to insult and impress.

Editorial Reviews

From the Inside Flap

Timorous tenderfoots, lackadaisical slouches, and closed-minded obscurants should avoid this fun and devious vocabulary book. Everyone else will delight in its blend of flabbergasting words, wacky quotes, and creative quizzes. Educator Phil Eisenhower has selected the words SAT and GRE takers love to hate?
such as obdurate, edacious, and vulpine?and made them memorable. Realizing that people remember insults better than any other words, the author has phrased each word as a humorous barb. The result is a vocabulary reference that everyone?from gangsters to students to presidents?can use to insult and impress.

About the Author

PHIL EISENHOWER has been an English teacher in some of California's toughest schools. This is his first book.

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Random House Reference; large type edition edition (December 9, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0375720413
• ISBN-13: 978-0375720413
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 0.6 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.5 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,000,726 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #55 in Books > Large Print > Reference

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Learning New Words Has Never Been So Devilishly Fun!, April 4, 2007

By 

Trisha A. Howell "Howell Canyon Press author" (Los Angeles, CA, United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Vicious Vocabulary (Paperback)

I love vocabulary books and have read many over the past 40 years, but none has ever been as entertaining and laugh-aloud funny as Vicious Vocabulary. Phil Eisenhower, the self-proclaimed "Professor Snurd," has created 17 chapters with 85 lists of devilishly fun and funny disparaging words, each list followed by "Basic Barbs," "Brainy Barbs," "Words Your Mother Warned You About," entertaining quotes, and lots of quizzes, followed at the end by "Final Synonym Slurs."

Snurd gleefully explains that his "pejorative put-downs" are "words most likely to be on the SAT or GRE but all the offensive ones so that you can insult people." Vicious Vocabulary is a source of hours of fun while you learn words that will empower your vocabulary in all, but especially (playfully) belittling, situations.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best vocabulary builder book you'll ever find, May 7, 2004

By 

a pre-dental student (San Francisco, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Vicious Vocabulary (Paperback)

I've learned new vocabulary so fast that I can't even believe. I can't wait to see Phil to write his second book.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Needs depth; forget the quotes, July 8, 2005

By 

Young reader (Illinois) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Vicious Vocabulary (Paperback)

This book is a good idea. Why possess a big vocabulary when most of it is simply for comprehension and intelligence--where's the fun in that?!
"Vicious Vocabulary" teaches the more negative, yet just as useful words a person should know.

However, "Vicious Vocabulary" only half-delivers that fun.
Despite a somewhat helpful paragraph at the beginning of each unit (of alphabetical words) that incorporates the words that'll be taught, the definitions of the words are mediocre and meager at best. They are simply too short and reveal little information--denotation, connotation, usages, etc. However, I am comparing this to "Verbal Advantage", a vocab-building book which offers those things. Simply put, "Vicious Vocabulary", although not competing with "Verbal Advantage", simply doesn't compare.

In addition to meager definitions, the words are placed alphabetically. What would be better would be to place them in order of difficulty--and it wouldn't be that hard. For example, which is "harder": flagrant or flagitious? Methinks most are aware of flagrant, but not flagitious (though in "Vicious Vocabulary", the words are simply placed alpha-order).

The last thing I must bring attention to is the quotes. They are completely useless and unnecessary in a vocab-building book. One or two is OK, but to have them underneath EVERY definition?

This book had potential, but unfortunately fell short.