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English usage – conditional transformation: Improve the mixed conditional by choosing the best form to express a past unreal condition about room brightness and the resulting ability to read.

Difficulty: Easy

Correct Answer: Had the room been brighter

Explanation:


Given sentence
'If the room had been brighter, I would have been able to read for a while before bed time.'


Concept/Approach
The sentence is a correct third conditional (past counterfactual). A concise, formal improvement is to use the standard inversion that omits 'if': 'Had + subject + past participle, …'


Improved version
Had the room been brighter, I would have been able to read for a while before bedtime.


Common pitfalls
'If the room was' mixes condition types; 'If the room are' is ungrammatical.


Final Answer
Had the room been brighter

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