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The sentence praises the memo for resolving a dispute “in barely half a page” with “crisp precision.” The blank must convey brevity without any negative implication. “Laconic” means concise, terse, or using few words—exactly what the sentence celebrates. “Garrulous” means excessively talkative, which contradicts “barely half a page.” “Equivocal” indicates ambiguity or the use of language open to multiple interpretations; the memo is described as precise, not ambiguous. “Abstruse” means difficult to understand, again clashing with “crisp precision.” On GRE Text Completion, look for multiple cues that converge: (1) length cue (“barely half a page”), (2) outcome cue (“resolved … dispute”), (3) style cue (“crisp precision”). Together they signal brevity paired with clarity—hallmarks of “laconic.” A good tactic is to plug choices back into the sentence; with “laconic,” the rhetoric remains coherent and complimentary, whereas the other options either invert the tone or introduce a meaning the author clearly rejects.