ICAME Journal No. 24 Reviews Collins COBUILD Grammar Patterns 2: Nouns and Adjectives, edited by Gill

According to the editors, the Collins COBUILD grammar patterns 2: Nouns and adjectives (henceforth 'Patterns 2'), the companion volume to the Collins COBUILD grammar patterns 1: Verbs, 'presents all the patterns of English nouns and adjectives, and relates these patterns to meaning' (p vii). A noun or adjective pattern consists of the noun or adjective, together with the typical or significant words that come after, or in some cases before it (p vii). Roughly 10,000 nouns and adjectives have been studied for patterns (p ix), and over 200 patterns are presented in the volume (p vii). As its target audience, Patterns 2 has intermediate learners and above, though the volume is also intended for teachers of English. Patterns 2 is organized in the following way. The Introduction includes information on what constitutes a pattern, and an explanation with exemplifica-tion of how a pattern is presented in the volume. It also includes advice on how to use Patterns 2, a special section with advice for teachers, and a glossary of grammatical terms with definitions of the terms used in the volume. The bulk of the book consists of descriptions of the patterns themselves. The patterns are divided into two main sections: those with a noun as headword and those with an adjective. There are also subdivisions within these groups, so that for instance all patterns consisting of nouns followed by prepositions are treated in the same section. Below this level, the patterns themselves constitute the sections. After all the patterns have been gone through, there is an Appendix to explain different forms of patterns caused by a change in word order, for instance. At the end of Patterns 2 come a Pattern Finder including all the patterns taken up and a Word Index including all the nouns and adjectives listed; both include page references. Patterns 2 is based on a pragmatic view of language: according to the editors , '[o]ne of the most important features of the Grammar Patterns series is its identification of the link between pattern and meaning' (p viii). As an example