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I was practicing for my English test then I came across this question.

This is one of the best novels that have appeared this year.

  1. that
  2. that has
  3. to have
  4. No improvement

According to me the answer to this question should be "that has" in place of "that have" but the answer is No improvement.

So I am a little confused that why is it not ("that has") the right answer because we are talking about one singular book out of so many.

I get confused a lot of times at such questions.

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  • @Laurel Indeed, It is. But I couldn't understand the accepted answer.
    – Ashish M
    Commented Sep 21, 2019 at 1:46
  • Ashish, what don't you understand about the answer? Please edit your question to explain exactly what you're stuck on.
    – marcellothearcane
    Commented Sep 21, 2019 at 9:18
  • Have a look at my second answer (given in a comment, as the question is a duplicate) at He is one of the boys who play-or-plays football. The question is probably more approachable, and shows possible different readings. / / In your example here, the original, (1) and (3) are all idiomatic and mean the same thing. But here, (2) sounds very unnatural and would have a different meaning: << This is one of the best novels(!) and it has appeared this year. >> There's a time problem.
    – Edwin Ashworth
    Commented Sep 21, 2019 at 16:46
  • ... To license (2), there would have to be contrived context like "No decent new fiction is being written. All the best novels were written decades ago.:(" // ... "Nonsense. 'Wrightright' has just published its top 10 of all time best novel list. There are some decent new books in this shop. Look! This is one of the best novels that has appeared [just] this year." Contrived, forced, unnatural ... but grammatical and not illogical. // But an improvement?
    – Edwin Ashworth
    Commented Sep 21, 2019 at 16:58
  • 1
    No; 'that has appeared this year' is defining here, as is 'one of the best novels'. 'This fulfils both criterion A (decent fiction) and criterion B (recent).'
    – Edwin Ashworth
    Commented Dec 30, 2019 at 20:02

2 Answers 2

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The sentence is correct and so it needs no improvement.

This is one of the best novels that have appeared this year

here many best novels have appeared this year.

Though the sentence begins with one of, the subject is the best novels so the relative pronoun that is followed by a plural verb have.

*One of the boys is missing

Here only one boy is missing.

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-1

A certain number of novels have appeared this year (plural). This is one of the best of those novels (that have appeared).

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    I think this answer is just confusing as it doesn't directly correspond to the sentence in the question and carries no explanation of why you've changed the form.
    – KillingTime
    Commented Sep 21, 2019 at 9:57
  • @KillingTime I accidentally used been published instead of appeared - I have now corrected my error. I hope it should now be clear why 'no improvement' is required.
    – Kate Bunting
    Commented Sep 21, 2019 at 16:09

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