The Ring of McAllister
AuthorRobert Marantz
Publication date
2003
ISBN0-7432-3520-7

The Ring of McAllister: A Score-Raising Mystery Featuring 1,046 Must-Know SAT Vocabulary Words is a mystery novel and SAT preparatory book written by Robert Marantz and published by Kaplan, Inc.

Plot

Will Lassiter is a seventeen-year-old who lives in the town of Red Fork. When his neighbor, Dr. Octavio Perez, vanishes from the mysterious Stone Manor, Lassiter becomes enveloped in a mystery that involves the late Algernon McAllister, a well-known patron of the town. The protagonist locates Perez, rescues his daughter, and discovers the secret of the abandoned mansion.[1][2]

Author

The author, Robert Marantz, formerly worked at Kaplan as a software developer, but he left the company to work as a screenwriter. He intended for the book, which was published jointly by Kaplan and Simon & Schuster, to be "a light entertainment" and "[s]omething that [wasn’t] a chore to read".[1][3]

SAT preparation

The 329-page novel contains 1,046 vocabulary words that test-takers are likely to encounter on the SAT, the most frequently used college admissions exam in the United States. Each word is boldfaced in the text and defined in a glossary at the end of the book. The novel is intended to teach students the meanings of the words in context in a way that engages readers, thereby improving students' performance on the SAT's verbal section. The Ring of McAllister followed several other fictional test-prep books, including Harcourt's Tooth and Nail (1994) and Barron's Simon's Saga (2002).[1][2][3][4]

Critical response

Readers' reactions to The Ring of McAllister varied: one praised it as "a brilliant way to learn SAT vocabulary", while another quipped that "after about 50 pages, you might actually find a word you didn't know".[5] The Chicago Tribune called the book "a decent read", commenting that although its boldfaced words were "a bit jarring", reading the novel was a more enjoyable way to study for the SAT than "nodding off over a boring vocab list".[6] A reviewer in the Spokesman-Review gave the book a grade of D, deriding its "plot and writing style" as "juvenile" and opining that "your time is valuable and better spent the old-fashioned way—memorizing flashcards".[7]

References

  1. 1 2 3 Cavanagh, Sean (2003-02-05). "A Tome for the Timorous And Tremulous". Education Week. ISSN 0277-4232. Retrieved 2022-06-07.
  2. 1 2 Boeckman, Joanne (February 19, 2003). "Mystery book may raise goose bumps, SAT score". Des Moines Register. p. 17. Retrieved June 7, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  3. 1 2 Toppo, Greg (January 9, 2003). "Publishers market line of SAT test prep novels". Public Opinion. p. 18. Retrieved June 7, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  4. ↑ "New Book Puts SAT Vocabulary Words In Context". Tyler Courier-Times. Associated Press. January 12, 2003. p. 48. Retrieved June 7, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  5. ↑ Ghezzi, Patti (March 11, 2005). "Publishers exploit SAT's vernacular". The Atlanta Constitution. pp. A1, A20. Retrieved June 7, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  6. ↑ "SAT preparation? It's a mystery to us". Chicago Tribune. February 2, 2003. pp. 13–9. Retrieved June 7, 2022 – via Newspapers.com.
  7. ↑ Sandpoint, Julie Lovenbury (October 27, 2003). "'The Ring' a big waste of time, money". The Spokesman-Review. pp. B7. Retrieved June 7, 2022 – via ProQuest.
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