[This book] focuses on developing students' comprehension and critical-thinking skills. [The author] uses a carefully designed sequence of explanations and exercises that allows students to approach critical reading as a natural extension of essential comprehension skills, rather than a discrete set of new strategies. Armed with the ability to both analyze and evaluate a writer's work, students are encouraged to apply those twin intellectual tools to [the] readings to determine purpose, analyze evidence, detect bias, recognize tone, and compare opposing points of view. -http://www.college.hmco.com.