Best Verbal GMAT Books 2012

Best Verbal GMAT Prep Books

Common Book Bundles

1. Need to figure out your weaknesses? Take a GMATPrep test or one of the other many free GMAT tests available.
2. Looking for a verbal study plan? General GMAT study plan | Verbal GMAT study plan
3. Need to start with basics? (recommended for international applicants) - start with MGMAT Verbal Foundations
4. OK with verbal but need some help in a short period of time? Try the Kaplan Verbal Workbook
5. Need highest score and have time: MGMAT Guides + MGMAT Verbal Foundations (esp for RC)
6. Need specific question practice? use gmat club tags
7. Need help with Grammar? Try Ultimate GMAT Grammar book by GMAT Club

Books and Study Plans at a Glance
	Standard/Quick	Advanced/Thorough	Specialized
General Strategy Books Explain how GMAT works, provide general principles and strategies, give an idea about weaknesses, provide practice tests	Official Guide 12 + comes with 900 official questions Kaplan Premier + comes with 6 CAT's	Official Guide 12 + comes with 900 official questions 8 MGMAT Guides + come with 6 online tests or 15 Veritas Prep Guides + come with 5 online tests	Kaplan GMAT 800 - Poor guidebook, more of a question collection
Quant Books Refresh math principles, fill gaps, and learn patterns	Kaplan Math Workbook - missing probability and combinations	OG Quant 2 - somewhat easy	MGMAT Math Foundations MGMAT Advanced Quant Total GMAT Math
Verbal Books Refresh grammar rules, aquire CR and RC strategies	Kaplan Verbal Workbook	OG Verbal 2	MGMAT Verbal Foundations PowerScore CR Aristotle SC Ultimate GMAT Grammar LSAT Books – goes beyond the scope
GMAT Practice Tests Tests included with books or recommended practice	6 Kaplan Practice Tests + come with Kaplan Premier + Take 1 free	6 MGMAT Practice Tests + come with MGMAT books + Take 1 free 15 Veritas Prep CAT tests + come with Veritas books if purchased at VeritasPrep + Take 1 Free	GMAT Club Tests + Take 2 Free Other GMAT Tests

1. General Verbal Review Materials

Official guide for GMAT Verbal Review 2nd Edition
Excellent for additional verbal practice questions, but don't expect to find any grammar rules or verbal strategies here.
Strengths:
1. 300 real GMAT questions
2. Real GMAT questions retired from past tests
3. The practice questions are organized by level of difficulty
4. The practice questions follow actual GMAT test patterns - great to have one's ear trained.
Weaknesses:
1. The book does not contain any strategies
2. It does have a few short review sections but they are very weak
3. Mostly low and medium difficulty questions. Not very helpful to a person aiming to get above 700.
Note: See detailed comparison between First and Second Editions here: the-official-gmat-verbal-review-1st-edition-vs-2nd-edition-83882.html?view-post=628557#p628557




Kaplan GMAT Verbal Workbook
Good Verbal review but only 650-700 level. Specialized books recommended for a higher score.
Strengths:
1. Realistic strategies for every part of Verbal section
2. Useful Idioms and Vocabulary list
3. Good paper and publishing quality
Weaknesses:
1. Few hard verbal questions
2. Some questions (CR) are not very representative of the "authentic" questions

Other notes: All the practice questions from this book are available on CD-ROM that comes with Kaplan Premier Program

2. Critical Reasoning

The PowerScore GMAT Critical Reasoning Bible
Considered the best GMAT book for Critical Reasoning questions.
Strengths:
1. Clearly divides the CR question types and provides with specific strategy solutions for each type
2. Gets the results - this is the most recommended book on GMAT Club for CR
3. Well laid out, making learning easy and quick
Weaknesses:
1. Though more questions are available than in the MGMAT book/online quiz bank, it could still use more practice questions
Note: This book is very similar in terms of strategies or tips to the MGMAT CR book; there is no value in owning both
For chapter by chapter book notes, see this post: summary-of-the-powerscore-cr-book-82539.html




Manhattan GMAT Critical Reasoning
Second best - comes with access to MGMAT's 4 online CAT tests yet refers to the OG for practice questions
Strengths:
1. Strategies that work
2. Explanations to the OG questions are very clear
3. Comes with access to 6 online CAT tests (all Manhattan GMAT books have this feature)
Weaknesses:
1. Requires purchase of OG 11 or Verbal OG. No practice questions in the book - instead it provides reference to questions in the Official Guide
2. Online question bank is comparatively small
Note: This book is very similar in terms of strategies or tips to the PowerScore CR book; there is no value in owning both

3. Sentence Correction

Manhattan GMAT Sentence Correction
Highly recommended. Considered the best book for SC.
Strengths:
1. Thorough coverage of GMAT grammar concepts
2. Convenient layout
3. Access to 6 Online MGMAT CAT's
Weaknesses:
1. Practice question are not provided but refer to the 11th edition of the Official Guide and the Official Guide Supplements
Other notes: One of the most referenced books for SC on GMAT Club forum.



Aristotle SC Grail
Pretty good and would make an excellent supplement to MGMAT SC
Strengths:
1. Concise
2. The content is organized in a very effective manner
3. The Idioms List!
4. Overall, the organization is crisp and concise

Weaknesses
1. It is a PDF.
2. There are no practice problems or associated content (there is a separate question bank available now)
3. It doesn't go into too much detail.




GMAT Club's Ultimate GMAT Grammar
Ultimate Grammar Book for the SC section of the GMAT.
Strengths:
1. All SC areas covered and explained in detail
2. 500+ exercises and 500+ GMAT-like SC questions
3. GMAT idioms with explanations and examples, tables, usage, problematic words, etc
4. Optional section on punctuation and also section on articles and other often ignored subjects/topics that international students struggle with

Weaknesses
1. Not yet - maybe a tad too long - 294 pages.

4. Reading Comprehension

Manhattan GMAT Reading Comprehension
One of the first RC books on the market - could be better.

Strengths:
1. The first and most used GMAT book fully dedicated to RC (contains 69 questions)
2. Comes with RC passages and questions unlike the other MGMAT materials that only refer to OG

Weaknesses:
1. Too few practice questions to deliver a significant score improvement
2. Needs more strategies. I felt the MGMAT Verbal Foundations had a lot more RC basic skill development tools and strategies




Veritas Prep Reading Comprehension
Good overall strategy and provides useful insider tips

Strengths:
1. Plenty of practice - 96 Reading Comprehension questions in 23 passages
2. Good passages in terms of difficulty and quality
3. 30 pages of strategies and RC skill-development

Weaknesses:
1. None

5. Free Books

GMAT Pill eBook: How to Ace the GMAT
A 120 page EBook covering SC/CR/RC/PS/DS split into 2 pieces with questions and tips on how to ace the GMAT.

6. Exotic Books

PowerScore LSAT Reading Comprehension Bible
For hardcore RC practice only! Usually not necessary and only to be used by 700+ applicants. It is a level higher than GMAT.
See a review of this book by bmillan01 review-of-powerscore-s-rc-bible-86718.html







LSAT Critical Reasoning
If you need to turbocharge or nuke your Critical Reasoning this may be a book to consider. Note - not a pure GMAT book and does contain significant amount of irrelevant information. With that said, a good source of 700+ questions.
Discussion of LSAT materials for use on GMAT

THANKS BB ..

can u suggest any book for me.
i have taken my GMAT Prep 1 and scored around 540.
my Score Q 47, but i m sure i can improve my Q score in range of 51.
and Verbal was around 18 (i don't remember my exact break up).
how can i improve my Verbal Score. its killing me everyday.
my aspiration is high, and wanted to score 99 Percentile.

pl don't refer to any link or post. i want expert opinion and whatever recommendation i got, i ll focus only that book or strategy.

Thanks in advance.

Good one!! Thanks bb

good post! appreciate the recommendations.

Thanks

Reserved for future use

Thanks bb. What would you recommend for verbal practice questions? Most of the books described here have less practice questions.

For verbal, you want to stick as closely to the OG 12 and Verbal OG as you can. I found MGMAT, Kaplan, and Veritas books to be good. Veritas actually probably has the most questions in their books.

MGMAT Books come with access to online question banks that are expanded on a regular basis, so you can use those too.

Thanks for the recommendations. Big fan of the Manhattan series.

Thanks bb for the recommendations.
Just a concern: I need to strenghten my Verbal level, though I was able to do 34, 38 (MGMAT) and 35 (GMATPrep) on Verbal section: I feel that I can perform to more than 40 in Verbal.
Hence I have bought OG Verbal2 and need to acquire the latest Kaplan 800 as well (electronic version). Could you please advise where I could find it? Actually, i need to practice with the toughest and most helpful question sets.
Thanks to advise.

Man , so many books. I wonder with this new meaning emphasis in SC , some books will only be released for that purpose.

Anyways BB , nice list and ranking... +1

With the GMAT switching focus to meaning- would you recommend any specific book?

I don't think GMAT is switching anywhere and there are no new books that have come out really to focus on any switch except the small new section to be added "Integrated Reasoning"

I have given GMAT once and scored 23 on verbal. Need to raise my score to atleast 35 in the next 20 days. can anyone reccomend me an electronic source or a book?

Hey bud I am glad I saw ur post. I would pick up Manhattan Verbal Foundations. Nothing made sense to me in SC or CR before I picked it up. Its one of the best texts ever!!

thanks for your reply. Can you suggest me link to this book where i can buy the pdf version? or the pdf version for kaplan verbal workbook. unfortunately i cant get orders from amazon shipped to my country and this book is not available locally

http://www.amazon.com/Foundations-of-GM ... B005AZZ6TA

Here is the link buddy for the Kindle Version!

Yes, Amazon Kindle is your friend.
Works on a PC, iPhone, and anything else in between...

great post...thanks

I find Manhattan SC and Powerprep CR the most useful