Word Parts Dictionary: Standard and Reverse Listings of Prefixes, Suffixes, and Combining Forms

I thought the book was definitely good at breaking down the words. I bought it to help me study for the GRE. But I found another book that is a lot cheaper and I have been using it more, so I would recommend the book "Dictionary of Word Roots and Combining Forms," by Donald Borror, if you want to study for the GRE.

Word Parts Dictionary, by Michael J. Sheehan, will be much appreciated by writers, linguists, and coiners of neologisms. Much of our complex language is made up of word chunks with specific meanings that combine with other fragments to form elegant-sounding compounds--"$10 words," as I once heard them called by someone with a preference for monosyllables. This dictionary defines all known suffixes, prefixes, combining forms, and bases; provides a reverse dictionary of meanings to locate that elusive particle; and groups some of the word parts into categories (animals, food, shapes, etc.). With no trouble at all, the user can formulate a new word for "obsession with pinching buttocks" (pygorrhexophilia), in case one is ever needed. A work of lexicoplastic brilliance. $39.95. McFarland. ISBN 0-7864-0819-7 (1042/C & RL News * December 2000)