100 Writing Mistakes to Avoid is the first book to come out of Daily Writing Tips, owned by Daniel Scocco, of Daily Blog Tips fame. Authored by Maeve Maddox, chief editor on the DWT site, the 45 page ebook offers ‘a practical guide to 100 common mistakes of spelling, usage, grammar and punctuation’. Since I’m a bit hung up on these things (and used to write for DWT once upon a time), I could hardly wait to dive in.
A Time Saver For Writers
The short introduction lays out the purpose of the book – to save writers time by giving them a quick way to identify and avoid common errors in written English. I was pleased to see that the book included information on British and American usage, where this differed, as well as points of contention, all of which are indicated with asterisks. Be warned, this is not the place to go to learn grammar – it’s intended for those who are familiar with common grammatical terms.
What’s Inside
100 Writing Mistakes to Avoid is divided into four sections: spelling mistakes, usage mistakes, grammar mistakes and punctuation mistakes. The layout is simple and clear. There’s a number followed by the words and expressions being discussed (in red), examples of incorrect and correct usage, followed by a couple of sentences giving meanings or explanations.
This book is for you if you’ve ever wondered:
- what the rule is on article use before an acronym
- which verb form to use with ‘either’
- whether you can end a sentence with a preposition
- where to put commas (there are several points on that in the final section).
There’s just one thing that would make 100 Writing Mistakes to Avoid even more useful: a clickable index of all the points, so I could easily go straight to the one I want to research.
How I Will Use It
Truth to tell, I don’t have many problems with the issues raised here, but there’s always that moment when you have a moment of self-doubt. This book will make it easier to identify and avoid mistakes which might make our clients think less of us. As a British writer who often writes for an American audience, it’s useful to have guidance on a few stylistic points that may feel wrong to me but may be right for my readers.
100 Writing Mistakes to Avoid is available from Daily Writing Tips at $19.99.
Article by Sharon Hurley Hall
Sharon Hurley Hall has been mentoring writers here at Get Paid To Write Online since 2005 to help them improve and build sustainable and successful writing careers. Check me out on sharonhh.com. Feel free to connect with me online on Google+.
Sharon has written 653 awesome articles for us at Get Paid to Write Online
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{ 2 comments }
Twitter: GeorgeAngus
July 5, 2010 at 13:17
Sharon,
I always get a kick out of these “writing mistakes” books. I find myself turning the pages with bait-like breath in anticipation of which ones I’ve been blowing out of the water all these years.
The chapter indexing issue is one that I think Amazon is finally addressing and I know Smashwords is tackling this as well. There are some clean ways of doing the indexing and it really is a gift to your readers to take the time to add this crucial component. Not as important with a novel perhaps but with non-fiction/reference it is almost a necessity.
George
George Angus wants you to read The Coffee House Internet Warrior
Twitter: shurleyhall
July 5, 2010 at 13:27
I know what you mean, George. I love the complexity of the English language but it’s good to know there are reference books to help us out when we need it.