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Voyager wrote:If you were in the brown reading group in 2nd grade, thought reading books and writing papers was for "dorks" in high school, graduated from some shit-hole college (anything with the word "state" in the title, for example) or any combination of the previous, you will have a difficult time with the LSAT.

Think_lax86 wrote:I am taking the LSAT for a 4th and final time in october/december... I have taken the Kaplan course for the first 2 times and scored 151, and 157 respectively... I took it a 3rd time just reviewing the Kaplan stuff and got a 159...

I am sick of Kaplan, although its mastery book and endurance prep books are helpful... I downloaded the old version of Powerscores Logical Reasoning and Logic Games Bibles because I heard they are really good... I havent heard so much about the Reading Comp Bible tho and so I am trying to figure out which would be the best book to get for this section... Reading Comp is easily my worst section and I am determined not to let it screw up my score again... I need 1 book for reading comp and I need to know which reading comp prep book I should invest in? PLEASE SOMEONE HELP!!!

splitterhopeful wrote:The Sound and the Fury by Faulkner. Oprah recommends it.

Bert wrote:I think its ironic that you are asking for a RC book with the understanding that you will read and comprehend the book enough to help you read and comprehend short passages in the LSAT.

PS - I would say get a tutor for RC as it is the hardest section to bring up if you are having problems.

The Invisible Man wrote:

splitterhopeful wrote:The Sound and the Fury by Faulkner. Oprah recommends it.

+1

Think_lax86 wrote:I am taking the LSAT for a 4th and final time in october/december... I have taken the Kaplan course for the first 2 times and scored 151, and 157 respectively... I took it a 3rd time just reviewing the Kaplan stuff and got a 159...

I am sick of Kaplan, although its mastery book and endurance prep books are helpful... I downloaded the old version of Powerscores Logical Reasoning and Logic Games Bibles because I heard they are really good... I havent heard so much about the Reading Comp Bible tho and so I am trying to figure out which would be the best book to get for this section... Reading Comp is easily my worst section and I am determined not to let it screw up my score again... I need 1 book for reading comp and I need to know which reading comp prep book I should invest in? PLEASE SOMEONE HELP!!!

MLBrandow wrote:mudbug25,

I actually just picked this up yesterday. As Mall_cop$ mentioned, there are at least a few other very helpful threads on the topic. But if you are too lazy to search, here is the executive review as I remember it:

- The RC Bible is probably of minimal value, but seems helpful.
- It is certainly the best published guide on RC.
- If you have the money and time to spare, it isn't a bad investment.
- Be wary of doing all the examples in the book, as almost all of the comparative reading sections available are printed therein, as well as other passages from the most recent tests. This may skew your preptest scores.


At least for me, the only real RC Prep I have done other than outside reading is the Examkrackers RC guide last spring. I'm only two chapters in to the RC Bible, but the concept of drilling in itself is probably going to be a solid confidence builder. At least that's why I picked up the book. I'm pretty sure the only real stumbling block for me is my diagramming, and this book proposes a workable solution.

This probably also is covered in either back search, but a former poster (and current HLS student) Voyager posted his method for RC which is touted as one of the better--and free--approaches to RC.

Best of luck in your prep.

MLBrandow wrote:Examkrackers RC Book Review

First off, buy this book if you are struggling with RC and are taking the June LSAT. I have spent hours in my local bookstores sifting through RC strategies from other companies (call me a cheap ass), as well as reading through the free samplings on google's e-book cache (call me a cheap ass more). This book is well worth the $23 if you are finding yourself in a heap of trouble on RC.

Here is what makes this book more useful than anything else I've come across yet:
- It focuses on breaking up the passages by how the main point is presented and the arguments are structured, rather than by what the passage is about (a la Kaplan and a few others).
- It has a few in-chapter drills which hone the specific skills it teaches as you learn them, rather than delving into RC all at once by taking whole sections from the get-go.
- Each lecture focuses on one passage type and one question family.
- The mini-exams corresponding to each lecture are excellent. Each focuses solely on the relevant material you learned.
- It's the only book that I've come across yet with a comprehensive comparative reading section (17 pages).
- Many of the "typical wrong answer choices" that correspond to each answer type do, in fact, come up often, and are easy to spot once made aware.
- I like the book's use of color to draw attention to certain wrong answers, although this is ancillary at best.


Here are shortcomings of this book:
- If you are anal like me and have every PrepTest that can be feasibly attained, then the "extra practice" sections at the end are useless. It has 95 questions spanning roughly 15 passages that are all pulled from actual LSATs. However, if you are lazy and don't like buying all the PrepTests (bad idea, but hey, that's your prerogative), then this belongs in the other category.
- The paper this book is printed on pisses me off. It's glossy and reminds me of my high school textbooks rather than of the LSAT.
- There is a little sun-shaped mascot in various persona aside most of the pages, and it's really annoying.
- While the information this book provides is valuable, the method of presentation is questionable. I would like to see more examples in each lecture (it's pretty barren, only one per chapter), and I would also like to be given the opportunity to process a problem for myself rather than having to be walked through it.
- While some of the explanations are pretty solid, a few of the wrong answer choice explanations are too brief.
- The Title of Chapter 11 (the Reading Comprehension Review), is referred to in the subsequent page headers as Chapter 9. This indicates to me a bit of a rushed product.
- This book does not place enough emphasis on parsing. It simply says "remember this" in some cases where parsing would be very helpful.


Conclusion:
Overall, the biggest pluses this book has to offer are its dissection of different passage types and the mini-exams, which drill specific passage- and question-types. The biggest drawback was the lack of examples.

This book is laden with useful information, but you do have to get by its sometimes peculiar presentation to glean that information from it.


Rating:
Relative Usefulness - 4.5/5 (versus existing prep books)
Absolute Usefulness - 3/5 (in terms of what is necessary to master RC)
Clarity - 4/5
Quality of information - 4.5/5
Overall Rating: 3.5/5

Recommendation:
Buy this book if you are struggling with RC and are taking the June LSAT. Consider buying this book if you are struggling with RC and are taking a later LSAT, as Powerscore's RC Bible will be released July/August.





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DayDay11,

This looks like it might be quite a helpful book.

Here is a direct link:

--LinkRemoved--

I would be interested to see reviews on this product. I have never heard of Examkrackers before.


Edit: I noticed that it just came out a few weeks ago, so I went ahead and ordered it from Amazon.com for $22.00. I'll volunteer myself to be the guinea pig, as this is really the only section giving me grief.

I'll send out a review in a few weeks.

EDIT: http://www.buy.com/prod/Examkrackers_LS ... 05563.html

$13.79 (shipping included) via special offer on Buy.com

Atlas LSAT Teacher wrote:Finnegan's Wake?