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Glite Dictionary
to make book

to make book

1 9.3
To take bets on who wins an event like a sports match
  • phrasal verb
  • Archaic
translation icon : aceptar apuestas
  • As a seasoned bettor, she often makes book during the horse races.

Examples

  • But he made book too on stuff only a VA hospital had a line on.

    Fiction book (1991)

  • PK, I bow out; you can't make book.

    Fiction book (1992)

  • After studying the odds, he decided to make book on the next football match.

  • He wants to make book during the championship game this weekend.

How Involved

to make book
  • Archaic
1 9.3
gamble
12 3.9
to bet
568 1.5

Surface Forms

make book infinitive
made book past
made book past participle
making book present participle
makes book third person singular

Morphology

make + book

While 'make' + 'book' might superficially suggest 'create a record' from the common senses of the constituents, the MWE specifically denotes placing or accepting bets (bookmaking), a specialized, idiomatic meaning. A B1 learner who only knows basic senses of 'make' and 'book' would not reliably infer this betting sense, so the expression is not transparently compositional.

Etymology

Make book may come from the old habit of people who took bets writing each wager in a paper book so they could keep a record. That's why make book now means 'to take or place bets'.