The letter A: Too much of a good thing

If you have too many letter As, there are plenty of short words to help get you out of trouble:

AA – a type of volcanic lava

AAH – exclamation of surprise, pleasure, etc.

AAL – an Asian shrub or tree

AAS – plural of AA

ABA – type of cloth made from goat or camel hair

AGA – Muslim ruler

AHA – exclamation of triumph or surprise

AIA – a maid or nanny

AKA – a type of vine

ALA – a wing

AMA – a vessel for water

ANA – a collection (e.g. Victoriana)

AUA – yellow-eye mullet

AVA – a Polynesian shrub

AWA – away

BAA – sound made by a sheep

CAA – Scots for call

FAA – Scots for fall

MAA – sound made by a goat

By Barry Grossman

Barry is a leading UK Scrabble player and winner of several tournaments. He is the author of Scrabble for Beginners (Chambers), Need to Know Scrabble, Scrabble – Play to Win and The Little Book of Scrabble Trickster. He has also contributed to numerous other books on the subject of words and word-games, has been a series champion of Channel 4’s Countdown, and has written four comedy series for BBC Radio 4. He lives in Hertford.

All opinions expressed on this blog are those of the individual writers, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or policies of Collins, or its parent company, HarperCollins.

Other Articles

Letter C

C can be a very useful letter to have. It combines well with the high-scoring letters H and K to give you the chance of a high score for just a four- or five-letter word. If you can play something like CHUNK or… Read More

Bonus Bs

The most likely way of using B in a bonus word is probably something beginning with BE- or BI-. The -ABLE suffix is also worth remembering (NOTABLE, OPENABLE) and quite a few with an optional E in the middle:… Read More

Not the B all and end all

The B is not one of the most useful letters. It’s most often used in shorter words, preferably on a premium square to increase its value, and preferably to help you get rid of your other less useful letters. Good B-words for this are: BEZ an… Read More