eBook Review: McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book et alia

William Holmes McGuffey, McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book

Product Details

• File Size: 149 KB
• Print Length: 152 pages
• Simultaneous Device Usage: Unlimited
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
• Language: English
• ASIN: B004TRTFK6
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• Lending: Enabled
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars (6 customer reviews)
• Price: $0.00 (FREE)

1. Short review:    (Amazon rating: 1 out of 5 stars -- I hate it. If I could give it 0 stars, I would.)

2. Long review:

2.1. What I liked:  Nothing.
Roller-coaster or walk-in-the-park? Should be a walk in the park but it is a mugging in an alley.

2.2. What I did not like: The lack of illustrations. The original had illustrations. In place of each is now a barren statement of [Figure].
The terrible formatting. The formatting was so bad that it made the book unreadable.

2.3. Who I think is the audience: For the original, the audience is esoteric historians and homeschoolers. For this version, only masochists need download it.

2.4. Is the book appropriate for children to read?  No. A thousand times "NO!"

2.5. On the basis of reading this book, will I buy the author's next book? No.

2.6. The plot in a nutshell:

     There is no plot. McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book was used as a grammar school textbook in the 19th century in the US.

2.7. Other:
     I also downloaded and perused the following:
McGuffey's First Eclectic Reader, Revised Edition;
McGuffey's Second Eclectic Reader;
McGuffey's Third Eclectic Reader;
McGuffey's Fourth Eclectic Reader;
McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader; and
McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader.
     One and all suffer from the same faults as the Spelling Book: They lack illustrations and the formatting is so bad as to render the book unusable.
     In spite of this, I highly recommend McGuffey's books -- just not the Amazon Kindle versions. Instead, go to the Gutenberg Project and download the PDF versions. Do not waste your time downloading another version. Get the PDF versions.
     I added a bonus book: McGuffey's Eclectic Primer, Revised Edition.

2.8. Links: (All links to the Gutenberg Project.)

McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book
McGuffey's First Eclectic Reader, Revised Edition
McGuffey's Second Eclectic Reader
McGuffey's Third Eclectic Reader
McGuffey's Fourth Eclectic Reader
McGuffey's Fifth Eclectic Reader
McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader
McGuffey's Eclectic Primer, Revised Edition

2.9. Buy the book: I shall not give you a link to McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book on Amazon. You deserve better. Use the Gutenberg Project links above.