Great Reads for GRE Prep

By Jordyn Austin on April 20, 2017

If you plan on going to graduate school, you will likely have to take the Graduate Record Exam, otherwise known as the GRE.

It is important to know the score your program requires in order to get accepted into the program. In order to achieve the score that your program is looking for, you are going to have to do some prep work and studying before you take the exam.

Below are some helpful books to read and other tools to prepare for your exam. These books can help you prep for your exam or even help you improve your GRE score if you took the exam before and did not particularly get the score you were hoping for. The books will help you enhance your understanding of the difficult vocabulary, grammar, and sentence composition as well as analytical thinking for when you have to read the lengthy narratives.

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Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

If you have ever read dystopian literature, you know that the themes and concepts are sometimes a little difficult to understand. The book heavily includes difficult vocabulary that depicts a disturbing glance at the future of corrupt societies. This book journeys through a society where there is no individuality, no literature, no freedom, no religion, and so much more.

Once you get a breakdown of the themes and meanings in the book, it is a pretty interesting read that can not only entertain but also provide great practice for the verbal portion of the GRE.

The Best American Essays

Every GRE test taker should be familiar with knowing how to organize main points and break down complex sentences on the exam. This skill will help students be able to not only get through the complex things quicker but also have greater accuracy.

The Best American Essays is composed of various essay series that require analytical thinking to read very similar to the GRE. The essays in this book will also help a student build up the difficult vocabulary you need to know for taking the exam. The book has many words that are defined in their pages. You could write these words down on flashcards and use them to study for the GRE.

The Wizard of Oz Vocabulary Builder by Frank L. Baum and Mark Phillips

Many articles review this book as one of the best vocabulary builders. The story uses a ton of difficult vocabulary that is accompanied by definitions that are easy to comprehend. The book has the original story of The Wizard of Oz that uses the vocabulary and definitions in sentences that are illustrated. The book is written by Mark Phillips who was formally a SAT verbal instructor, so he is very knowledgeable about the verbal section of exams. The book perfectly combines usages, context clues, definitions and narrative to make for an engaging learning and study tool.

The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen

The popular book The Corrections is centered around a Midwestern family whose children ran away to the east coast in order to be free from their parents. The book is completely full of GRE vocabulary and makes use of GRE-style sentences. The book is lengthy so you’ll want to give yourself a lot of time to read and digest it.

You definitely do not want test day to be the very first day you’ve seen or even heard of the advanced GRE vocabulary. You want to be able to get acquainted with and be able to maneuver your way through the difficulties. Reading a book like this will also help you improve your use of context clues.

GRE for Dummies

You can find the GRE for Dummies book in bookstores as well as on websites like Amazon and Ebay that offer discounted and various book forms. Like all the “for Dummies” books, this book is basically an easier instruction manual for all things GRE. It provides tips for maximizing your score on the GRE, strategies to maintain focus, tips on how to manage your time, and practice tools that help you get an understanding of how the actual test will be.

Although this is not a “fun,” interesting book, it breaks down all the components you need to score well on the GRE. This book thoroughly prepares you for the GRE and does so in an easy way that you can understand.

Free apps

Although they are not books, there are plenty of free apps for both iPhones and Androids for GRE preparation. There are apps specifically for advanced vocabulary that could show up on the exam. Just go to your app store and search “GRE prep,” and a ton of apps will come up. There are some apps that give you math practice, flashcards, and every other portion of the exam. These are helpful because it doesn’t cost any money and it is also convenient. Since you probably pretty much bring your phone anywhere, you could literally study anywhere.

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