 <p>mate... make the searchable columns into "fulltext" colums and then do</p> <p><code>SELECT * FROM books WHERE MATCH(fulltext_column) AGAINST('animal book a')</code></p> <p>best way. :) see <a href="http://devzone.zend.com/article/1304" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://devzone.zend.com/article/1304</a></p>