Tooth And Nail: A Novel Approach to the SAT

by Charles Harrington Elster

INCLUDES MORE THAN 1300 ESSENTIAL TEST WORDS

Both a thrilling mystery and a test-prep masterclass, Tooth and Nail is an entertaining, genius way to conquer the vocabulary section of SATs and ACTs.

Imagine you could study for entrance exams while reading a mystery novel. Underneath Tooth and Nail 's whimsical and propulsive plot is a truly effective SAT and ACT vocabulary-building program—complete with numerous reading comprehension exercises and more than 1300 of SAT examiners' favorite test words. This is a perfect book for students looking to improve reading comprehension and enjoy a good story all at the same time.

Genres: Fiction, Young Adult, Writing, Education, Mystery

368 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1994

About the author

Charles Harrington Elster is a writer, broadcaster, and logophile—a lover of words.

He is the author and narrator of the audio vocabulary-building program Verbal Advantage and the book by the same name. His other books include Tooth and Nail and Test of Time, vocabulary-building novels for high school students preparing to take the college entrance exams; There's a Word for It, a lighthearted look at unusual—and unusually useful—words; and The Big Book of Beastly Mispronunciations, which William Safire of The New York Times hailed as "the best survey of the spoken field in years." In 2005 Harcourt published What in the Word? Wordplay, Word Lore, and Answers to Your Peskiest Questions About Language, and in 2006 Houghton Mifflin released the second edition of The Big Book of Beastly Mispronunciations, featuring nearly 200 new entries.

Charlie was pronunciation editor of the seventh and eighth editions of Black's Law Dictionary and a consultant for Garner's Modern American Usage. He is a guest contributor to the "On Language" column of The New York Times Magazine, and his articles have appeared in the Boston Globe, the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, the San Diego Union-Tribune, and other publications.

Charlie has also been talking about language on the radio since 1985. He has been interviewed on NPR’s Talk of the Nation, Weekend Edition, and All Things Considered and been a guest on hundreds of radio shows around the country. For five and a half years he cohosted a weekly public radio talk show on language called A Way with Words.

Charlie was born in New York City in 1957 and earned his B.A. cum laude from Yale in 1981. He lives in San Diego with his wife and two daughters.

Reviews

[Arlian · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this as an ESL teacher. I'm trying to find ways to help my students improve their vocabulary.

I think this book is PERFECT for that. Wow, this book will be such a challenge for my students to read. I'm very excited to use it with them. From a teacher perspective 5 stars. This book is awesome.

From a reader perspective....yeah. A bit less. Other reviewers have said that some of the writing is very awkward and weird, and it is. And I don't mean the "SAT word" sentences. Like, it's going to be hard to use academic vocabulary this much, you know? I expected some weirdness. But some of these sentences were just like, WEIRD. No one would talk like this, ever. Again--this isn't about using the big words. It's just.......wow these characters are unbelievable. The whole situation is pretty unbelieveable.

But I am pretty sure my ESL students won't be at the level where they are engaging with the 2-dimensional nature of the characters, so I'm not too worried about it.

So for ESL students: 5 star book. It's gonna be a *great* challenge.
For native speakers: 3 star book. It's kinda boring and unbelievable, and the words are too common to really be SAT words.

[Taryn Robinson-Jones · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story and plot took too long to get to. In the first 10 chapters it focusing too much on these secondary characters that have no true role or even just benefit the plot. They also have a whole chapter on a will reading that is incredibly boring because that’s just what is it nothing more. No drama no nothing just a will reading. Then by like chapter 17 it gets interesting and that’s when I was hooked. This book is kind of like the movie knives out but in a college setting. The last chapter left off at a cliff hanger and if you want to know what happened after you have to read the epilogue which was rushed and just confusing. For such a short book it was quite written correctly. There are only 31 chapters

[Barbara Ab · Rating 2 out of 5]

It’s a book created in order to help students to prepare for the SAT exam. Well! Boring to death at the beginning , then the story grab you a little, but on the whole boring. Useful for a student of English language as at the end of the book there is a dictionary

[Leila · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of the better summer reading books I’ve had. Really good way to make SAT prep engaging. Three stars bc there were points where it got super boring and plot lines that I’m sure were there just to fulfill the use of some SAT words.

[Julia Jaenke · Rating 1 out of 5]

I would give this book zero stars if I could. Incredibly boring and 3/4 of the vocabulary was not new whatsoever.

[Drucilla · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story is one that's been told many times, but the characters are different enough to be interesting. I did learn quite a few new words, but it is kind of annoying to have to flip back and forth to find the definitions and I would often forget to flip back because I was paying more attention to the story than the words.

[Ke · Rating 3 out of 5]

This novel is a college mystery with several literary themes related to Shakespeare and Poe. What I really liked about this novel are its use of "SAT" vocabulary and literary themes. What I least liked about this novel is that it introduced dozens of characters, diluting the importance of the core characters.

[Eric Cabato · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is a standard, run-of-the mill mystery novel with an overbearing amount of exposition, to the point where it drags on and on until the point of boredom. The characters are not well developed either, but the thing that at least makes this readable is to help learn yourself on vocabulary; Other than that, I wouldn't see any other reason to read this book.

[Angela · Rating 1 out of 5]

I did not like the story of this book at all! The rising action and exposition was 85% of the book and I thought the vocabulary was helping me to learn higher vocabulary but I wish the book was more interesting.

[Amanda · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is used to prep you for the SAT. It does a pretty good job of it while telling an interesting story. Though not many like this book, I enjoyed it.

[Marissa · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story is pretty weak (think really watered down DaVinci Code), but it's a useful vocabulary-building book for SAT test-takers.

[Ly (Harriet) · Rating 1 out of 5]

For ones that have just started to learn SAT words for the first time. It does help to improve or review the words in simple contexts

[Nguyễn Nghĩa · Rating 3 out of 5]

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[Amandine Vynck]

er was eens een prinsesje en een prins en ze leven lang en gelukkig

[Lexie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Woah. Wasn't expecting such and interesting story. I really enjoyed it! Creds go out to my main man, R. Allsup.

[Cathy Hernandez · Rating 1 out of 5]

This was honestly the most boring book I have ever read! I mean it was helpful in learning vocab words, but the dictionary would have had a better plot than this.

[Angelica Palencia · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is a great way to learn vocabulary. However, the development of the characters and the plot took way too long.

[Jordan · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is not a very good book. Tooth and Nail is a poorly written book.

[Caroline · Rating 1 out of 5]

I would not recommend reading this book. It is poorly written and not very interesting.