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I was informed by a new editor that the sentence "I rate this book a 3 out of 4 stars" is incorrect. In the words of the editor - ""A" is wrongly inserted; you have already used "this" as a determiner, and there is no need for another one."

Could you please help me understand if this is true?

AWandP
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    "I give this book a rating of 3 out of 4 stars" would be clear. I agree with the editor that there is something wrong with using "a" referring to "rating" without using "rating" explicitly. – Greg Lee Aug 10 '19 at 17:42
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    I find "a" perfectly acceptable. The argument about this already present is incorrect too. this goes with book. "A" goes with 3. – Jim Aug 10 '19 at 19:07
  • If prior to this sentence you have mentioned "this book" you may want to replace "this book" by "the book". This is my conjecture about why the editor is complaining about using 'this'. – Pablo Straub Aug 13 '19 at 21:48

4 Answers4

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Both "I rate this book three out of four stars" and "I rate this book a three out of four stars" sound acceptable to me.

"I rate this book a three" seems grammatical to me (although maybe "I give this book a three" would be a more common verb in that kind of sentence). So I think the use of the indefinite article would remain grammatical when the additional clarifying information "...out of four stars" is added to the end of the sentence. "Three" would function in that context as a noun, I guess.

If there were some reason to consider it incorrect to use "a" here, it would not be because of the presence of this earlier in the sentence. This acts as the determiner for the noun book; the article a, which comes after book, is clearly not meant to be a determiner for book.

Based on a comment by tchrist, my current hypothesis is that speakers who object to your sentence don't find it natural to interpret "a three out of four stars" as "a three (out of four stars)", the way I did in the second paragraph of this post. I think that most people would accept "rate/give it a three out of four", with no following noun. For some reason, adding a noun after the second numeral seems to potentially change the interpretation of the first numeral's grammatical role.

herisson
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    I have trouble parsing "a three stars". – tchrist Aug 10 '19 at 17:26
  • @tchrist: ...which doesn't occur anywhere in the sentence. I don't think "a three out of four stars" necessarily behaves the same grammatically as *"a three stars out of four stars", which does sound fairly unacceptable to me. – herisson Aug 10 '19 at 17:28
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    I mostly agree with this answer. For the past 40 or 50 years, U.S. idiomatic English has employed the notion of "a ten" meaning "a rating of ten [on a scale of one to ten]." Given that widespread usage. Given that usage and its variants (such as "a ten out of ten"), the inclusion of the unit of measure (whether it be stars, dog bones, smiley faces, or dollar signs) is beside the point: what is being offered isn't a number of stars for the recipient to take home and use—it's an incremental position on a limited number line relative to other incremental positions; the unit of measure is trivial. – Sven Yargs Aug 10 '19 at 17:59
  • It would also make sense if it were I give this book a (three out of four stars) review. The absence of review might be assumed to be present, even though it's missing. That would make it an attributive noun phrase without the final noun actually being stated. Of course, in the actual sentence, it's rate that's used, not give. But it has the same kind of feel about it. – Jason Bassford Aug 10 '19 at 21:30
  • In the end, is this really a question of grammaticality or of style? – Mari-Lou A Aug 11 '19 at 04:26
  • @Mari-LouA: I'm fairly sure it's grammatical for me, but it might be ungrammatical for some other speakers (such as the editor, and perhaps tchrist). For speakers who find both constructions grammatical, the choice between them would be a matter of style. – herisson Aug 11 '19 at 05:34
  • 'Out of four stars I rate this book a three' sounds clear, which makes me think it's a stylistic issue. – S Conroy Aug 11 '19 at 12:27
  • +1 Mainly for your final paragraph – AndyT Aug 12 '19 at 08:49
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When writing about points or scores, I prefer digits to words.

If we accept that there is no problem with "a score of 3"

a score of 90%
a score of 3–2
He had an IQ score of 120

Source: Longman Dictionary

Then something that scores 3 stars, is perfectly fine

  • a score of 3 stars

When the context is clear, such as a restaurant, book or movie review, the grade refers to a score, which can be anything: badges, stars, chef hats etc.

  • I rate it a 3 out of 4 stars

In other words
   I rate this book a 3 [out of 4 stars]
   This book has a [score of] 3 out of 4 stars

If the determiner e.g. this is used with one noun, another determiner can be used with a different noun or plural noun phrase in the same sentence. For example,

  • The match ended in a draw
  • My house had a market value of $700,000
  • That table costs a whopping 4,000 euros
Mari-Lou A
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Your editor does not sound like a native English speaker. They may understand the grammatical rules of English, but they do not have an ear for the language.

A good editor who grew up with English would never say "'A' is wrongly inserted; you have already used 'this' as a determiner, and there is no need for another one."

That's just not how English works, and that one sentence is a terrible piece of writing.

I would not trust writing advice from anyone who writes like that.

Your original sentence does sound better without the "a", but it's still not quite right.

A great editor would have an easy answer for you: "Why don't you try this: 'I rate this book 3 stars out of 4.'"

That is pretty close to the ideal way of writing what you want to say here.

Michael Geary
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The "a" refers to "rating" which is understood and not to the noun "book". The sentence is awkward and the meaning could be made clearer though I do understand what is meant.

Aled Cymro
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