Say What?


Book Description

Finally! A grammar guide specifically designed for fiction writers! Introducing the second edition, with more than fifty new entries! WRITING CORRECTLY DOESN'T HAVE TO BE HARD Great writers write well. Grammatical errors mark a manuscript as unprofessional and the author as sloppy or an amateur. But you don't have to memorize the myriad of grammar, punctuation, and usage rules to have a well-written book. If you're a novelist or write creative nonfiction, this handy guide is essential-giving you the most common and applicable rules and tips to make your book shine-minus the pain! Inside you'll find Short, concise, and often humorous explanations of important grammar, punctuation, and word usage rules as featured on the award-winning blog Live Write Thrive. Bonus fiction-writing tips to help you tighten your prose and say what you mean in fewer, more appropriate words. Easy-to-navigate sections and a comprehensive index so you can find the answer to your grammar question right away. Whether you're a novice or experienced writer, you'll benefit from these clear and helpful explanations of grammar and usage based on The Chicago Manual of Style-the US book publishing industry's authoritative reference guide. You no longer need to search the web or thumb through a stack of grammar books to find simple answers to your grammar questions. With Say What? at your fingertips, you'll spend less time fretting over grammar and more time writing. And you'll become a better writer in the process! Here's what writing instructors say about this handy grammar book: "Good, concise and easily accessible reference books on grammar and usage is hard to find. I mean, are hard to find. This is one of them." -James Scott Bell, bestselling novelist, writing coach, and author of Revision and Self-Editing for Publication "This handy, user-friendly reference book, presented with style and humor, is a must for any writer serious about honing their craft and garnering respect for their works. An essential resource, the e-book will save you time with all its quick links to the short, snappy topics, and the print version is small enough to stay within reach beside your computer, so I highly recommend getting both. Respected editor and writer Susanne Lakin succeeds in making a dry topic interesting and meaningful! And using this book will also help you reduce your editing costs." -Jodie Renner, editor and author of Style That Sizzles "As a self-professed grammar nerd, let me just say this: The world needs more grammar nerds. Editor Lakin is doing her part to make this happen with her pithy, fun, and supremely useful guide to the everyday writing mistakes most of us don't even realize we're making. Her book is conversational and approachable enough to make for enjoyable reading. But its true value is in its 'lookupability.' This is the perfect guide to keep on your desk, next to your computer, for those moments when you're just not sure which word is right." -K. M. Weiland, author of Structuring Your Novel and Outlining Your Novel




The Handy English Grammar Answer Book


Book Description

Researching, writing, and citing. Hiring, firing, and selling. Texting, blogging, and posting. Proper grammar and usage for every occasion is explored through nearly 500 answers to common questions on English grammar and language. The first, best place to turn for an overview of English grammar! Whether you are writing a term paper, a scientific article, a résumé, a business email, a text message, or presenting information in the social media, The Handy English Grammar Answer Book is an engaging guide to writing with clarity. It offers fundamental principles, grammar rules, and punctuation advice, as well as insights on writing for different occasions and audiences. From a brief history of the English language to the deconstruction—and explanation—of the different parts of a sentence, and from showing how to punctuate correctly to how to organize a well-argued essay, this easy-to-use reference answers nearly 500 questions and offers fun facts on the English language and its usage, including ... How did language begin? How did English become a language spoken worldwide? What is Middle English? How did Noah Webster affect the English language? What efforts have been made toward reforming spelling? Are there any language universals? What is an adverb? What is a compound sentence? What is a dialect? What is jargon? What is a noun? What is a split infinitive? What is passive voice and when should you avoid it? Why are English words so hard to spell? What is the i-before-e rule How do I use commas correctly in sentences? When should I use parentheses? How do I use capitalization on the Internet? When do I use “that” versus “which”? What types of dictionaries are there? How do I find the right level of formality in my writing style? What is a sentence fragment? What is a misused modifier? Should I use its or it's? What is academic writing? What is the difference between primary and secondary research? How do I respect copyright laws? How do I use materials ethically on my own websites? What is plagiarism and how do I avoid it? How do I plan a structure for my term paper? How do I write an outline? How do I avoid writer's block? What is considered good essay form? How do I write business emails? Should I include personal data in a résumé? What is “netiquette”? How do I write an effective blog? For speakers and writers of all ages and skill levels, The Handy English Grammar Answer Book brings you straightforward explanations, tips on avoiding and fixing grammatical mistakes, as well as numerous examples of good writing. This helpful book includes an appendix of model papers, letters, and sample writing for every occasion—from business or social communications to academic papers or Internet forums. Appendices on irregular verbs, idioms, homophones, prepositions, frequently misspelled words, wordy phrases, frequently confused word pairs, and other common mistakes bring a deeper understanding to readers. There is also a glossary of commonly used terms, a bibliography, and an index.




A Pocket Guide to Writing in History


Book Description

A portable and affordable reference tool, A Pocket Guide to Writing in History provides reading, writing, and research advice useful to students in all history courses. Concise yet comprehensive advice on approaching typical history assignments, developing critical reading skills, writing effective history papers, conducting research, using and documenting sources, and avoiding plagiarism -- enhanced with practical tips and examples throughout -- have made this slim reference a best-seller. Now in its sixth edition, the book offers more coverage of working with sources than ever before.




The American Girl's Handy Book


Book Description

A publication for young ladies instructing them in such hobbies as fancy needlework, handmade dolls, china painting, painting in oils, heraldic painting, preservation of wild flowers, golf, bicycling, holiday decorations and many others.




Shimmering Images


Book Description

Rich, funny, and moving personal narratives depend on a few key moments in time to anchor the story and give it impact. Shimmering Images teaches the aspiring memoirist how to locate key memories using Lisa's technique for finding, linking, and fleshing out those vibrant recollections of important moments and situations. Shimmering Images will address: *the difference between memoir and autobiography *how to claim your voice *the art of storytelling *honesty, truth, and compassion in writing *authentic dialogue and the need for specificity Readers will learn how to craft a short piece of narrative nonfiction grounded in their core memories and master a technique they can use over and over again for writing other narratives. A must-have book for anyone who has treasured Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott or Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg.




Grammar Girl Presents the Ultimate Writing Guide for Students


Book Description

Named to the International Reading Association's 2012 Teachers' Choice book list Grammar Girl Presents the Ultimate Writing Guide for Students is a complete and comprehensive guide to all things grammar from Grammar Girl, a.k.a. Mignon Fogarty, whose popular podcasts have been downloaded over twenty million times and whose first book, Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing, was a New York Times bestseller. For beginners to more advanced students, this guide covers it all: the parts of speech, sentences, and punctuation are all explained clearly and concisely with the warmth, wit, and accessibility Grammar Girl is known for. Pop quizzes are scattered throughout to reinforce the explanations, as well as Grammar Girl's trademark Quick and Dirty Tips—easy and fun memory tricks to help with those challenging rules. Complete with a writing style chapter and a guide to the different kinds of writing—everything from school papers to letter writing to e-mails—this guide is sure to become the one-stop, essential book on every student's desk.




Oxford Guide to Plain English


Book Description

Plain English is an essential tool for effective communication. Information transmitted in letters, documents, reports, contracts, and forms is clearer and more understandable when presented in straightforward terms. The Oxford Guide to Plain English provides authoritative guidance on how towrite plain English using easy-to-follow guidelines which cover straightforward language, sentence length, active and passive verbs, punctuation, grammar, planning, and good organization.This handy guide will be invaluable to writers of all levels. It provides essential guidelines that will allow readers to develop their writing style, grammar, and punctuation. The book also offers help in understanding official jargon and legalese giving the plain English alternatives.This guide gives hundreds of real examples and shows 'before and after' versions of texts of different kinds which will help readers to look critically at their own writing. Helpfully organized into 21 short chapters, each covering a different aspect of writing. Clearly laid out, and easy to use,the Oxford Guide to Plain English is the best guide to writing clear and helpful documents.




The Global English Style Guide


Book Description

The Global English Style Guide illustrates how much you can do to make written texts more suitable for a global audience. Accompanied by an abundance of clearly explained examples, the Global English guidelines show you how to write documentation that is optimized for non-native speakers of English, translators, and even machine-translation software, as well as for native speakers of English. You'll find dozens of guidelines that you won't find in any other source, along with thorough explanations of why each guideline is useful. Author John Kohl also includes revision strategies, as well as caveats that will help you avoid applying guidelines incorrectly. Focusing primarily on sentence-level stylistic issues, problematic grammatical constructions, and terminology issues, this book addresses the following topics: ways to simplify your writing style and make it consistent; ambiguities that most writers and editors are not aware of, and how to eliminate those ambiguities; how to make your sentence structure more explicit so that your sentences are easier for native and non-native speakers to read and understand; punctuation and capitalization guidelines that improve readability and make translation more efficient; and how language technologies such as controlled-authoring software can facilitate the adoption of Global English as a corporate standard. This text is intended for anyone who uses written English to communicate technical information to a global audience. Technical writers, technical editors, science writers, and training instructors are just a few of the professions for which this book is essential reading. Even if producing technical information is not your primary job function, the Global English guidelines can help you communicate more effectively with colleagues around the world. This book is part of the SAS Press program.




Goddesses Never Age


Book Description

Though we talk about wanting to "age gracefully," the truth is that when it comes to getting older, we're programmed to dread an inevitable decline: in our health, our looks, our sexual relationships, even the pleasure we take in living life. But as Christiane Northrup, M.D., shows us in this New York Times best-selling guide, we have it in us to make growing older an entirely different experience, both for our bodies and for our souls. In chapters that blend personal stories and practical exercises with the latest research on health and aging, Dr. Northrup lays out the principles of ageless living, from rejecting processed foods to releasing stuck emotions, from embracing our sensuality to connecting deeply with our Divine Source. Explaining that the state of our health is dictated far more by our beliefs than by our biology, she works to shift our perceptions about getting older and show us what we are entitled to expect from our later years--no matter what our culture tries to teach us to the contrary--including: - Vibrant good health - A fulfilling sex life - The capacity to love without losing ourselves - The ability to move our bodies with ease and pleasure - Clarity and authenticity in all our relationships--especially the one we have with ourselves "Taking all the right supplements and pills, or getting the right procedure done, isn't the prescription for anti-aging," Dr. Northrup explains. "Agelessness is all about vitality, the creative force that gives birth to new life." Goddesses Never Age is filled with tools and inspiration for bringing vitality and vibrancy into your own ageless years--and it all comes together in Dr. Northrup's 14-day Ageless Goddess Program, your personal prescription for creating a healthful, soulful, joyful new way of being at any stage of life.




The Handy Communication Answer Book


Book Description

The Handy Communication Answer Book traces the history, explains the concepts and examines the skills needed to master effective communication for every occasion. Providing insights and advice, this useful primer looks at how to improve verbal, non-verbal and written communications.