Selling two hundred thousand copies in its first month

Question

Selling two hundred thousand copies in its first month, the publication of  The Audacity of Hope  in 2006 was an instant hit, helping to establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president .

(A) Selling two hundred thousand copies in its first month, the publication of  The Audacity of Hope  in 2006 was an instant hit, helping to establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president

(B) The publication in 2006 of  The Audacity of Hope  was an instant hit: in its first month it sold two hundred thousand copies and it helped establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president

(C) Helping to establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president was the publication of  The Audacity of Hope in 2006 , which as an instant hit: it sold two hundred thousand copies in its first month

(D)  The Audacity of Hope  was an instant hit: it helped establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president, selling two hundred thousand copies in its first month and published in 2006

(E)  The Audacity of Hope , published in 2006, was an instant hit: in its first month, it sold two hundred thousand copies and helped establish its author, Barack Obama, as a viable candidate for president

Patronus · Accepted Answer

(A) Selling two hundred thousand copies in its first month, the publication of The Audacity of Hope in 2006 was an instant hit, helping to establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president.
 1) "Selling...publication". Do you want to "sell" the "publication" or the book "The Audacity of Hope"
2) "helping" a verb+ing modifier incorrectly modifies the clause "the publication...instant hit"
 
(B) The publication in 2006 of The Audacity of Hope was an instant hit: in its first month it sold two hundred thousand copies and it helped establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president.
 1) "it" incorrectly refers to "the publication". It should be "The Audacity of Hope"
2) "in 2006" is an essential modifier and should modify "The Audacity of Hope" and not "The publication"
 
(C) Helping to establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president was the publication of The Audacity of Hope in 2006, which as an instant hit: it sold two hundred thousand copies in its first month.
 1) "which" is a noun modifier, and it incorrectly modifies "2006"
2) colon ":" is used to exemplify whatever was said in the fragment previous to ":". However, "it sold..." does not fit as an example to "Helping...hit"
 
(D) The Audacity of Hope was an instant hit: it helped establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president, selling two hundred thousand copies in its first month and published in 2006.
 1) "and published" must modify "The Audacity of Hope", nothing else.
2) "it helped...president" is not exemplifying the fragment before "The Audacity of Hope". Example of "instant hit" is exemplified by the fragment "selling two hundred copies" but unfortunately this choice places it too far away from ":".
 
(E) The Audacity of Hope, published in 2006, was an instant hit: in its first month, it sold two hundred thousand copies and helped establish its author, Barack Obama, as a viable candidate for president.
 CORRECT

daagh · Answer

How does one get the inkling from the stimulus that Obama was the author of the Audacity of Hope as newly mentioned inE?

Nightmare007 · Answer

Sir ,
unless he is an american or a bookworm, No one can. 
I have seen such SC questions in the forum.
For example, Unless someone sees movie Godfather one doesn't know that the town is actually famous for the film. One question was based on this knowledge.

ydmuley · Answer

OFFICIAL EXPLANATION:

You should see the logical problems with choice A: “the publication of” the book didn’t sell 200,000 copies – the book itself did. So A is incorrect. And because choices B and C make the same mistake, they’re eliminated, also. Choice D is on the right track until “…and published in 2006”. That portion needs a verb in front of it (“was published” or “had been published”), and without that is just a sentence fragment. Choice E commits none of these errors, and is therefore the correct answer.

Hence, Answer is E

Did you like the answer? Hit Kudos :good

shakun · Answer

Daagh Sir, could you kindly explain why B is wrong ?

Vezax27 · Answer

Selected E) as well. However, I'm still a bit puzzled of the modifier "in its first month"... doesn't the use of this modifier also modify the clause that Obama became an viable candidate and is therefore a change in meaning?

Of course all the others are still wrong but I'd be happy if someone could help out :)

Of course all the others are still wrong but I'd be happy if someone could help out :)

bluetrain · Answer

Yes, that is another problem of this question.

NeverGiveUp- Arpit · Answer

Definitely correct choice changes in the meaning of the sentence. How come one knows that Barack was the author of the book ?  mikemcgarry   GMATNinja  Do you guys think this kind of confusion GMAC will create ?

GMATNinja · Answer

Nope, you'll never see this type of confusion on an actual GMAT question. I'm in agreement with  daagh  above -- it's awfully weird that (E) suddenly mentions that Obama was the author, when that fact wasn't mentioned in any other answer choices.

Don't lose too much sleep over this one, friends...

KungFuGmat · Answer

Correct answer E. This is not an OG or GMAC question. It is written by Veritas Prep, I believe. I don't think we need to worry about knowing if Obama was the author of Audacity of Hope here.

(A) Selling two hundred thousand copies in its first month, the publication of The Audacity of Hope in 2006 was an instant hit, helping to establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president.

A is wrong because the modifier "Selling 200,000 copies in its first month", should be used for the book not the publication.

(B) The publication in 2006 of The Audacity of Hope was an instant hit: in its first month it sold two hundred thousand copies and it helped establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president.

The publication cannot be an instant it. only the book can be an instant hit. out

(C) Helping to establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president was the publication of The Audacity of Hope in 2006, which as an instant hit: it sold two hundred thousand copies in its first month.

here which as an instant hot should modify 2006, but is actually intended for the book. Wrong

(D) The Audacity of Hope was an instant hit: it helped establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president, selling two hundred thousand copies in its first month and published in 2006.

selling 200,000 copies in first month and published in 2006 incorrectly modifies candidate. Wrong

(E) The Audacity of Hope, published in 2006, was an instant hit: in its first month, it sold two hundred thousand copies and helped establish its author, Barack Obama, as a viable candidate for president.

This is grammatically correct and logically meaningful. Even if the fact presented here was a piece of fiction, there is nothing wrong.

mikemcgarry · Answer

I'll add my voice to this discussion of the question from NeverGiveUp- Arpit . While I agree with KungFuGmat that, from a grammatical & logical perspective, only (E) could be the answer, I also agree with my brilliant colleague GMATNinja in that I don't believe the GMAT would do this to us. All the factual information needed in a GMAT SC is given in the prompt. We are not left to make additional factual deductions based on the the only answer that could be correct from a grammatical point of view. I generally have great respect for the Veritas questions, but I believe the prompt of this one needs an appositive phrase specifying that President Obama is the author: that particular factoid cannot be left for the OA only. I hope this helps. Mike

sampriya · Answer

In choice D---> "published.." and "selling" could be parallel and also the two phrases are not separated by a comma.!
so how can we figure out that "helped" and "published" are in fact the ones meant to be parallel??
if we single out the modifier phrase "selling.....month" as the modifier phrase then shouldn't it be in a comma pair?

EducationAisle · Answer

Hi  sampriya , the main issue is the  modifier  issue in D:

selling , a  present  participial phrase, correctly modifies  The Audacity of Hope , because such present participial phrases modify the subject of the preceding clause.

On the other hand,  published , a  past  participle, does  not  modify  The Audacity of Hope . Such past participle phrases generally modify the noun/noun-phrase immediately before the past participle.

p.s. Our book    EducationAisle Sentence Correction Nirvana    discusses  Past participle phrase , its application and examples in significant detail. If you or someone is interested, PM me your email-id; I can mail the corresponding section.

kornn · Answer

Dear  VeritasPrepBrian   IanStewart   AnthonyRitz   GMATGuruNY   AjiteshArun   ccooley   DmitryFarber ,

I have similar doubt with  sampriya 
What's wrong with D.?
 (D) The Audacity of Hope was an instant hit: it helped establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president,   selling   two hundred thousand copies in its first month and   published   in 2006

According to the Veritas SC book's solution on Q50:
 
I don't quite agree with the above. I think "selling" and "published" are modifiers and can be parallel as well.

Note that V-ed modifier can come after the comma, ending the sentence as show in the official example below:
 Diabetes, together with its serious complications, ranks as the nation's third leading cause of death  , surpassed   only by heart disease and cancer.

According to MGMAT SC book Chapter 5 Parallelism:

AnthonyRitz · Answer

You can absolutely parallel an active participle and a passive participle -- "selling" and "published" in this case.

I disagree with the book's argument that "and published in 2006" is a fragment or misses a verb. As written, it is a parallel participle phrase. In the book's defense, if you  added  a helping verb (and a comma to close the preceding modifier), you could  create  a new clause -- "and was published in 2006" -- that would avoid some (but not all) of the logic/bad modifier errors I describe below. No doubt the book's author was thinking of the phrase as a failed effort to create such a structure.

The real issue here is logic (and bad modifier).

WHY should this be parallel to the "selling" participle? How does this describe the fact that "it helped establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president" in any possible way? What, exactly, is it even modifying in that clause?

Furthemore, how is this expounding on the fact that "the Audacity of Hope was an instant hit"? The colon following the first independent clause should tell me that the second independent clause elaborates on the first.

But this modifier does not do any of the above. It's badly placed, illogical, and wrong.

kornn · Answer

Dear  AnthonyRitz ,

I think the 2nd independent clause shows the result or the effect of the 1st one.

The Audacity of Hope was an instant hit :  it helped establish Barack Obama as a viable candidate for president 
The book was a hit -> It helped Obama (Because it was popular, it helped Obama)

Is this logical usage of colon?

AnthonyRitz · Answer

Of course! The first part of the second clause is totally fine. As is the colon itself.

But the "published in 2006" part does not expound on the first clause and does not belong in the second (this is why adding a helping verb and making this a new clause paralleling "helped" would not save it).

SachinB123 · Answer

"In its first month, it sold" , does it make sense that in book's first month, book sold... i dont know how it is making sense. Please help me out on the option E

EducationAisle · Answer

"in its first month" just means "in its first month (of availability)" Sachin.

By the way, hope you also noticed that all five options use the phrase "in its first month".

Also, "it sold two hundred thousand copies" does not mean that the book performed the act of selling; it just means that two hundred thousand copies of the book were sold in the very first month.

Selling two hundred thousand copies in its first month

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Selling two hundred thousand copies in its first month

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