The A is usually a useful letter to have, though you don’t particularly want more than one of them. It will fit nicely into lots of good seven- and eight-letter bonus words.
To help you find them, remember some of the prefixes and suffixes that A is a part of. There’s AB- and AD-: loads of words begin with both of these, such as ABJURES (renounces on oath), ABSTAIN, ADRENAL and ADHESIVE.
ANTI-, being made up of four of the one-point tiles, starts a lot of useful words too. Here are a few handy ANTIs, along with their definitions:
ANTICOLD preventing the common cold
ANTIDRUG opposed to illegal drugs
ANTIFAT of a drug, etc., tending to remove fat
ANTIFUR opposed to the wearing of fur
ANTIJAM preventing jamming
ANTILOCK designed to prevent overbraking
ANTILOG mathematical term
ANTIMAN hostile to men
ANTIPOLE the opposite pole
ANTIRUST treated so as not to rust
ANTISAG preventing sagging
The A is in suffixes too, like -ABLE, -ATE, -ANT, -IAL and -IAN.
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.
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