What books do you recommend to study from?

estephanialvarez

I want to buy books to prep myself for the LSAT, however there are so many choices to choose from! It makes it almost impossible to make up my mind. Please help!

Nanchito-1-1

All the 10 Actuals, then you rip them up and make copies. Also, The Trainer by Mike Kim. It helped me with lr and rc.

Nanchito-1-1

and 7sage.

Cant Get Right

I haven't used all of the books; but for the most part, they're all actually kinda awful to be honest. The Trainer is the exception, but I think LSAT prep is just such an extensive process that even the best prep book is going to have severe limitations when compared to the potential of an online curriculum. The way the LSAT is graded, you're scored by how you compare to other test takers; so you really don't want to be up against people working with vastly superior resources. 7Sage is currently the best of the online resources, so I say forget the books all together and grab a 7Sage package.

Accounts Playable

I'll throw some non traditional thing in here that I thought were useful. 7Sage, Trainer, PTs are all great, but I found these a lot of help, too:

Introduction to Logic by Harry Gensler (doing the problem sets/logic cola was really helpful)

Informal Logic: A Pragmatic Approach by Doug Walton (an in depth view of a lot of common fallacies that are tested on the LSAT)

How to Solve It by George Polya (the part on analogies is extremely well written)

Alex

@estephanialvarez said:
I want to buy books to prep myself for the LSAT, however there are so many choices to choose from! It makes it almost impossible to make up my mind. Please help!

I mean obviously I'm a convert and enthusiastic supporter of 7Sage. So I'll preface what I'm about to say with that. Further, I think 7Sage is a comprehensive, affordable, and superior option to any book, course, or anything else I can think of. Short of 7Sage the only thing I would consider is Mike Ross taking my LSAT.

That said, I also think there are good books out there. The LSAT Trainer by Mike Kim being one of my favorites. I never finished it, but I plan to. I cut my study schedule with The Trainer short once I began 7Sage. But it is so good, I think everyone taking the LSAT should read it.

Also, I think Manhattan LSAT books are great, too. They are really good at breaking down question types and they don't have gimmicks or anything like that; it's pretty straightforward logic with them as well. I own the trilogy and skim through the Manhattan LR Prep while using 7Sage and it is a good supplement. If I wasn't using 7Sage, I would probably just be using The LSAT Trainer + Manhattan Prep Trilogy.

Powerscore is also a favorite for LSAT takers all over the country/world. And I'll go against the 7Sage orthodoxy here and say I think they are good for what they are; If you are trying to score a 150s or 160s score. I think Powerscore is the most user friendly way to get started with the LSAT as far as books go. They are a bit gimmicky, and they don't tend to dive deep into certain things. (conditional logic being a pretty important one, lol) But overall, I think they get way too much hate on here. The RC Bible however is a different story. I think that was largely useless.

Also as already mentioned the "10 Actual" books are a must have!

Kaplan, Princeton Review, Barrons, etc. The rest is complete garbage in my opinion. They are basically Powerscore without the gimmicks. These books are completely useless.

In sum, I do think there are good LSAT books out there. LSAT Trainer, Manhattan > Powerscore > Everything else.

Notwithstanding all of that, 7Sage is, at least in my opinion, superior to any and all LSAT books.
I can say this from experience, because it wasn't until I revised 7Sage's lessons that I really began to see improvement. I think one of the biggest problems for me with LSAT books is that sometimes I felt like I was spinning my wheels and not really improving. I finished the entire LG Bible and was still missing a TON of LG. Gave me a solid foundation to build on though, so it wasn't completely useless by any means. It just lacks strategy. 2 weeks with 7Sage and I was missing hardly any...


Hope this helps!

Sprinkles

@"Alex Divine" said:
If you are trying to score a 150s or 160s score. I think Powerscore is the most user friendly way to get started with the LSAT as far as books go. They are a bit gimmicky, and they don't tend to dive deep into certain things. (conditional logic being a pretty important one, lol) But overall, I think they get way too much hate on here. The RC Bible however is a different story. I think that was largely useless

That was the nicest letdown of PS I've seen in a while lol

Cant Get Right

@montaha.rizeq said:
That was the nicest letdown of PS I've seen in a while lol

Haha, yeah.

I agree though. PS definitely got me into the 160's faster than many other programs probably could have. It was never going to get me OUT of the 160's though.