Confused Words Exercise (692)
In each sentence, choose the correct word from the pair of similar terms. (If both words possibly can be correct, choose the more plausible one.)
Answers and Explanations
1. She walked around the side of the house to appraise the damage.
appraise: evaluate, or set a value on. "A jeweler must appraise the ring before it can be insured."
apprise: inform, or make aware: "He has been apprised of the issues the report has identified.
2. At the request of the ambassador, who envied his influence with the prince, he was recalled.
behest: command, or urgent prompting. "At the queen’s behest, the prisoner will be pardoned for his crime."
request: an act of formally or politely asking for something. "Without looking at Jane, he addressed his request to her."
3. The plan is fraught with danger and risk.
fraught: charged, emotional. "Their marriage had long been fraught with issues."
wrought: created, decorated, or formed: "I sought to remind them of the good he’d wrought despite his faults."
4. They took turns relating the story, careful to include all the pertinent details.
pertinent: related to a discussion or thought. "Reasoning that her revelation was not pertinent to the situation, he decided not to share it with them."
salient: very important or noticeable. "She was still able to give the police a few salient facts about her attacker."
5. She was concerned about the rift in their relationship.
riff: a brief pattern of repeated musical notes, or a short set of comments, or a variation. "I told him that it wasn’t cool to steal a riff from somebody else’s song."
rift: a deep crack in the ground, or a break in a relationship caused by conflict or disagreement. "More likely, it was an attempt to cause a rift between them."
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