Is That a Word?: From AA to ZZZ, the Weird and Wonderful Language of SCRABBLE

by David Bukszpan, Dave Hopkins (Illustrator)

Scrabble® aficionados may know that both "Brr" and "Brrr" are legitimate plays, but what about everyday names like Peter, Carl, and Marge? They're not listed as proper nouns, but they are certainly playable. For lovers of Scrabble®, Bananagrams®, and Words with Friends®, this lively guide helps readers make the most out of word games, packed with new ways to remember the best words alongside tips for improving game play and much more. Part strategy guide and part celebration of all things wordy, this collection of facts, tips, and surprising lists of playable words will instruct and delight the letterati.

Genres: Nonfiction, Language, Reference, Words

176 pages, Hardcover

First published July 13, 2012

Reviews

[James Kubecki · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pretty decent book. The first part of the book is an interesting history of Scrabble, and discussion of some variations on the game that are available, as well as differences between home/"parlor" play and tournament play. The bulk of the book, however, is more reference than actual "reading" text, of interesting & useful words that are allowed in the game, along with richer definitions than you'd find in the official Scrabble dictionary.

[Shelly Janger · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you love Scrabble, you'll really like this book. I plan to use it as a reference to learn new words - which will be funner than simply picking a dictionary page to study. My first word of the day is "ixodids" for a Bingo. Ixodid = tick.

[Suzie · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a book of lists of interesting words. If you love words and word games, you will enjoy it. For better or for worse, I think that's not totally my thing. I also have trouble reading books like this intermittently, which is how this would be best read.

[Craig Rowland · Rating 3 out of 5]

Is That a Word? From AA to ZZZ, the Weird and Wonderful Language of SCRABBLE® by David Bukszpan was a homorous take on the quirky lexicon of Scrabble. Since I am a Club and Tournament player I know very well what Bukszpan was writing about and in a book like this, where knowing how to spell words correctly is the object of the game, you can't afford to print typos. Oddball words they may be, yet they are a second language to me, and while a casual reader about the game of Scrabble might not be able to tell if such a word was misspelled or not, I can spot a misspelled dorky Scrabble word in a second. Bukszpan's book was full of them. It is an embarrassment that I had to take note of so many. Bukszpan had the official Scrabble word sources at his disposal, and even cited definitions from them verbatim. I can only blame sloppiness and poor editing for all the mistakes within. Let's start with the Acknowledgments page, where he misspelled the first name of Word Freak author Stefan Fatsis as Stephen. He did get it right later in the book but then flipflopped back to Stephen. To add further insult to members of the Scrabble royal family, he got Joel Wapnick's name wrong on p. 112 (misspelling it as Watnick) but fixt it in the end Sources section.

I wonder who in the competitive Scrabble community Bukszpan was talking to or what books he was reading to come up with this:

"If placed across two Triple Word Scores--known as a double-triple..."

No one in the competitive Scrabble community calls a word that covers two triple-word-score squares a double-triple. A word that spans two premium red squares is known as a triple-triple. Its score is multiplied by nine, so it may also be called a nine-timer. A double-triple (a term which I have heard) only applies in the most unlikely of cases where a player misses the centre star on his first play and his opponent allows the word to stay on the board to enable his own placement of a word to cover the star and a red triple-word-score square. That is a double-triple and they never happen.

Bukszpan gave a list of the highest-scoring two-letter words yet limited the list just to words utilizing the five unique tiles, JKQXZ. Two-letter words that have a K (at the time of publication, only ka and ki were acceptable) score merely six points each, whereas three other words: by, hm and my each score seven. None of those even needs one of the five unique tiles to score higher.

The author ended the book with cutesy stories and tongue twisters to highlight each letter of the alphabet. I am such a Scrabble nerd that I did not need to read the accompanying vocabulary lists to decipher what the stories meant. I liked that he employed a good illustrator, David Hopkins, to draw dozens of Scrabblish terms such as a hoopoe, nailset and a teiid.

If the author wishes to correct his next edition, here are the locations for his spelling errors:

persuing (for perusing, p. 9); Koaph (for Kaph and/or Koph, p. 32); unidead (for unideaed, p. 52); a plural of cicisbeo is not cicisbeis (p. 67); willyway (for willywaw, pp. 76 and 163); Vizslal (for Vizsla) and zorrille (for zorille, both p. 105 yet zorrille also appears on p. 169); zzyzyva (for zyzzyva, p. 107); Haeffet (for Haffet, p. 111); horizaontal (for horizontal, p. 119); Impli (for Impi, p. 136); phycho (for psycho, p. 140); skiddo (for skiddoo, p. 147); qaug (for quag, p. 150); a plural of sheqel is sheqalim, not sheqel(-im)(p. 153); the author lists erroneous plurals of sen and sau as sens and saus (neither form takes the -S)(p. 157); Avadavant (for Avadavat, p. 162); kuvaszo (an erroneous singular form which he might be confusing with the plural, kuvaszok, p. 172).

In listing words up to eight letters long that contain two X's, Bukszpan included maxixe(s) and paxwax(es), yet forgot xerox(ed, ing, es), exotoxin(s) and exotoxic (p. 107). His anagram list of words containing AEEINRT omitted ARENITE from p. 114 but included it on p. 119; likewise his anagram list AEINRTU omitted RUINATE from p. 119. Some words have a myriad of alternate spellings. Bukszpan left out a few for tsuris, namely tsooris, tsouris and tzuris (p. 72) and for ganef he omitted ganev (p. 72). So call me a mamzer for having the chutzpah to kvetch yet I do find it funny that Bukszpan, who is Jewish, threw in kibbutz as an alternate spelling of kibitz (p. 72).

[Rayfes Mondal · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed some of the history of Scrabble but I'm not that interesting in playing the game so I skipped the parts about learning good Scrabble words

[Richard Lehingrat · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun read, lost 4 in a row since ! ***

[Stacy · Rating 3 out of 5]

My family has become addicted to the Scrabble app and have had many discussions about what za means, or how to pronounce qi or who could score the most bingos. We all admit to occasionally throwing tiles on the board and testing to see if the game takes it. When I saw this book, it seemed like a fun read.

It is along the lines of a Scrabble word list, but it is more. There are definitions, stories, explanations, logic, tips, lists and fun compilations. And who knows...maybe I'll get to play one of the non-vowel Gaelic words and really annoy my family!

[David V. · Rating 4 out of 5]

An entertaining fun book that will occasionally cause you to laugh aloud, and also will help you become a better Scrabble player. Even if you only remember a few of the really good words, your game will improve. I've been playing the game on a NOOK, and competing against random players as well as friends. So far I've had opponents from 27 states, 6 provinces, London, England, and St Maarten in the Caribbean. It's also interesting to communicate with these people from other places.

[Mariah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nice scrabble tips for beginners at the beginning make this tome accessible for all. If you are the type of player who also wants to know the meanings of those odd words, this will satisfy you immensely, and it's organized thematically, yet also a bit haphazardly.

[Vicki · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great little book if you love word games and I do! Interesting history of Scrabble and lots of delicious lists of very interesting words! After finishing it I loaned it to my sister, Kerri. Not sure if that was actually a very good idea. :-)

[Wil · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun romp through the world of Scrabble. For the wordsmith out there, lists of Scrabble words unlike others: the focus here is not only whether there are q words that don't need a u, or words with bingo stem AEINST, but grouped thematically in an appealing and interesting way.

[Janet · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you like Scrabble or word games in general, this book is great. There's interesting history of the game itself, but more importantly, a large section of mnemonics for obscure words with definitions.

[Carianne Carleo-Evangelist · Rating 3 out of 5]

While not as good as Word Freak or Letterati, this was a good book. I enjoyed the way it mixed Scrabble's history with new words. While he makes the point that a good Scrabble player doesn't necessarily need to know the word's meanings, I like that he included them.

[Max · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cute!

[Deborah · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you think no other word game compares to Scrabble, like I do, you might appreciate this book. It's a palatable way to learn some useful moves. Too many errors/typos, though.

[Rae · Rating 3 out of 5]

Informative, especially in a strategic way.

[Carol Keeney · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun stuff about the words that are legit in scrabble

[Tara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Poorly written but all sorts of ideas for obscure words to use up bad letters. If I could only remember them!!

[J.]

DNF Some parts about the creation and evolution of scrabble were interesting but the lists of words were mostly not. I stopped reading when the author included "strip scrabble" as a varition with detailed rules.