Rewrite Right! : Your Guide to Perfectly Polished Prose: ... (ISBN 1580082394)

Amazon.com Review:
Good, clear writing appears effortless. But chances are, the more effective the communication, the more work that went into making it so. Rare is the individual whose professional or personal life doesn't call for some written communication. Jan Venolia's Rewrite Right! is small enough to slip into a laptop carrying case, yet it offers, as the author says, "a solid foundation in the principles of revising." Venolia recommends editing on two levels--first to improve the writing, then to correct the language--and lays out her lesson plan with a four-page editing checklist. Most professional writers (though, believe me, certainly not all) understand the importance of writing to an audience, avoiding jargon and hackneyed expressions, and getting the words right. But anyone else who writes could benefit from a no-nonsense guide such as this. Venolia peppers her text with lists (e.g., of stuffy words, biased language, clichés), humor, and examples from the likes of Mark Twain and Isaac Bashevis Singer. Entertaining quotations strewn throughout are fresh and to the point. ("Writing a first paragraph," quips Lynn Z. Bloom, "is like raising a first child. It's better if you start out on the second.") "Good writing gets things done," says Venolia. Her Rewrite Right! offers valuable tips on "how to tug on words and adjust them until they say what you want them to say." --Jane Steinberg

Good functional little book:
This is a simple and functional book that will assist any editor or writer. It contains some very useful advice about the craft of rewriting which is 80 per cent of writing.

Fits nicely on th writing desk:
Jan Venolia covers the editing process in essentially five stages: Content, style, punctuation, grammar and mechanical style. Rewrite Right functions better as a grammatical reference book than as a guide for how to edit an article or book. This is because her discussion of style, punctuation and mechanical style all inherently involve understanding grammar. Vernolia's approach is to writing is technical, not theoretical. So, if your thinking and writing is nebulous, and you need help refining your ideas into a coherent message, Rewrite Right is not the book for you. However, if you are pleased with the orderliness of your work, Rewrite Right will assuredly help you isolate grammatical errors and inconsistencies in your writing style. Venolia also points out the grammatical subtleties that separates amateur scribblers from professional writers. Rewrite Right is more functional than other grammar books I've purchased because it is small, 6 X 7, and contains just 189 well-used pages. Her use of images and short sentences from famous authors, particularly Mark Twain, also make this a fun read and quick learning tool. Her Index saves time.

You write, you say?:
If your answer is yes, you should own this book. In one version or another, it's been on my desk forever. Venolia dots all the "i"s and crosses all the "t"s. (Did I say that right?)