Barron's GRE Verbal Workbook, 3rd Edition

There is no explanation in the answer keys. What the author considers as an explanation is along the lines of “C is the answer because it just makes sense,” or “It makes sense that D is the answer because *insert restated sentence*”.A lot of the passages require outside knowledge to understand even though the author says it is unnecessary. What is even more frustrating is that a lot of the questions and answer choices are ambiguous. The ETS GRE exam will never be this ambiguous as all the answers rely on contexts and logic straight from the passage. For example, “nascent” and “embryonic” have the same meaning, but without a clear explanation, embryonic seems to be the correct choice here (see image).The only positive thing about this workbook is that it has allowed me to become aware of obscure vocab words.All in all, do not use this book for practice. You will most likely become frustrated like me. I would recommend Princeton Prep or materials from the official GRE ETS company.

The book really doesn’t tell you any ways to help you do better. I would get this in addition to a course (like Magoosh) it really is just practice.

Not bad.

quality of verbal questions are mediocre at best when compared to other competitors. Very different from official guide.