Everything Grammar and Style Book: All you need to master the rules of great writing
Good grammar is as critical to a successful personal and professional life as good grooming. Yet many struggle to master the basics. Enter this straightforward and entertaining book, which will teach even the worst grammarphobes how to write crystal-clear emails, professional-sounding letters, or articulate term papers.\ Completely revised and updated, this edition of an Everything bestseller includes:\ \ Steps to mastering difficult punctuation\ Effective revision techniques\ Tips for clear...
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Good grammar enhances the impression you make on people the minute you open your mouth or put pen to paper. If you've struggled to master grammar and style, look no further than this straightforward and entertaining guide. The Everything Grammar and Style Book, 2nd Edition is packed with easy-to-follow guidelines for effective writing, from proper word choice and punctuation to paragraph organization and editing techniques.You'll learn how to write crystal-clear e-mails, professional-sounding letters, articulate term papers, and more. This book shows you how to:Master difficult punctuationRevise until your writing shinesWrite clearly and conciselyCorrect commonly misspelled and misused words Practice your new skills with Checkpoint exercises at the end of each chapter Find the best Web sites for spelling rules, style help, and interactive quizzesThe perfect desk reference, this book has all the ingredients you need to conquer your fear of grammar-and become a great communicator!
Top Ten Reasons for Using this Book xIntroduction xiWhat's in a Word? 1Spelling It All Out 2Making More: Forming Plurals of Nouns 3So Many Rules! 5Unlocking the Secrets of Root Words, Prefixes, and Suffixes 9Checkpoint 12Cracking the Code of Punctuation 13Avoiding the Problem of Miscommunication 14The End of the Road 15May I Quote You on That? 18Quotes Within Quotes: Single Quotation Marks 22Checkpoint 23More Fun with Punctuation 25The Dreaded Apostrophe 26Cutting It Short: Contractions 26What's Mine Is Yours: Possession 27Joint Versus Individual Possession 30A Rare Occasion: Using an Apostrophe to Form a Plural 30Commendable Comma Comments 31Using Commas with Compound Sentences 33Checkpoint 38Punctuation Pairs 39Cleansing Your Colon 40The Serviceable Semicolon 41The Power to Divide and Unite: The Hyphen 44May I Interrupt? The Dash 47The Inside Scoop: Parentheses 48Making a Rare Appearance: Square Brackets 50Checkpoint 52Wrapping It All Up 53Getting Fancy: Italics and Underlining 54Angling for Some Attention: Angle Brackets 58What You're Not Saying...Ellipsis Points 59Slash It All! The Slash/Virgule/Solidus 60Checkpoint 61Parts of Speech-the Big Eight 63Step Right Up and Name Your Noun 64Pithy Pronouncements on Pronouns 65Three Little Questions for Adjectives 68Show Me the Action (and the Being): Verbs 69Admirable Advice about Adverbs 73What's Your Position on Prepositions? 74Who Put the Junction in Conjunction? 76Heavens to Betsy! and Other Interjections 77Checkpoint 78More Pieces of the Puzzle 79Here Come the Hybrids: Verbals 80The Starring Roles: Subject and Predicate 84Making It Complete: Complements 86Checkpoint 90Let's Have a Few Words 93Finding Fundamental Phrases 94Bringing It Up a Notch: Clauses 96Putting It All Together: Constructing Sentences 101Keeping the Harmony: Subject-Verb Agreement 104Checkpoint 111Pertinent Points about Pesky Pronouns 113Introducing the Pronoun 114The Numbers Game: Problems with Agreement 115When in Doubt: Vague Pronoun References 118One, Two, Three: What Person for Me? 122Making a Case for Pronouns 124Who and Whom: A Different Slant 128Checkpoint 131Figuring Out Some Finicky Forms 133Let's Talk Tenses 134Those Irritating Irregular Verbs 137What Kind of Mood Are You In? 143Comparatively Speaking 145Avoiding Double Negatives 148Checkpoint 149Keeping It Coherent 151Manglers of Meaning: Misplaced Modifiers 152Dangling and Squinting Modifiers 154Parallelism in Writing 155Logically Speaking 162Checkpoint 168Shaping Strong Sentences 169A Few Words about Fragments 170Reining In Run-on Sentences 175Transitional Words and Phrases 180Classifying the Connectors 182The Biggest Bugbears 184Checkpoint 200In Plain English, Please 201Steering Clear of Cliches 202No Need to Repeat Yourself! 204When Less Is More 207Close, but No Cigar: Misused Phrases 208Mirror, Mirror, on the Wall, Whose Mistakes Are Worst of All? 210Checkpoint 215Putting Pen to Paper 217Practical and Profitable Preliminaries 218Out in the Open: The Outline 223Delineating the Details of Your First Draft 226Relax and Leave Your Writing Alone-For Now 231Checkpoint 232The Final Dress Rehearsal 233Rereading, Revising, and Rewriting 234The Proof Is in the Reading 241When Really Bad Is Really Good 243Checkpoint 246Maximizing Your Means of Expression 247Short Takes 248Business and Technical Writing 253If X, Then Y: The Cause-and-Effect Essay 254Learning to Look Beyond the Obvious 255The Abridged Version: The Precis 256The Process Paper 257Digging Up the Details: The Research Paper 258Checkpoint 260Getting Personal 261Taking a Stand: The Argument Essay 262Advancing an Assessment: The Critical Analysis 263Dear Diary: The Journal 264Painting Word Pictures: The Essay of Description 265The Autobiographical Narrative 266An Opportune Occasion to Offer an Opinion 267Egads! E-mail 268Checkpoint 271Literary Terms You Need to Know 273Echoing Your English Teachers: The Basics 274Beyond the Basics 275In Praise of Prose 277Praising Points of Poetry 280Poetry-The Beat and the Feet 281Oh! The Drama of It All! 283Checkpoint 284Latin-Alive and Kicking! 285It's Everywhere! Everyday Latin 286Ex Obscuritate in Lucem (From Ignorance to Learning) 288Ignorantia Juris Non Excusat (Ignorance of the Law Is No Excuse) 290Feeling a Little Under the Weather? Latin in Medicine 293Sacred Settings: Latin in Church 294Checkpoint 296Foreign Languages in Everyday American English 297Neighbors to the South: Spanish 298The French Connection 300Achtung!-Paying Attention to German 302For the Italian in All of Us 304Come Together Right Now: Other Languages 306Checkpoint 308999 of the Most Commonly Misspelled Words 309Root Words, Prefixes, and Suffixes 317Suggested Substitutes for Wordy Phrases 323Checkpoint Answers 327Index 331
