need help with SE

[nikhil]

While the famed novelist’s first book was full of lively stories and nail-biting finishes, it seems as though she might have run out of material; the sequel is a book full of all but __________.

options -

1>wit

2>intuition

3>dogma

4>bombast

5>vivacity

all but denotes contrast ,so , the blank should be similiar to "lively stories and nail-biting finishes" or vivacity?

[ZDS]

In this case, "all but" is not being used as a contrast phrase. It means "very nearly" (see this post conjunctions - "All but" idiom has two meanings? - English Language & Usage Stack Exchange for an explanation of the idioms.)

 

You could say something like: "I all but died when I saw my GRE score after the first attempt." Which would translate to: "I very nearly died when I saw my GRE score after the first attempt."

 

Similarly, in this sentence the sequel is very nearly full of _______. The blank that works here is "bombast" - which is essentially empty language. So in total the sentence is saying: "While her first novel was exciting, it seems that she ran out of material; the sequel was essentially just empty language designed to impress."

 

It is a confusing idiom, and frankly a poorly phrased sentence. But hopefully the double meaning clears this up!