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How To Not Write Bad: The Most Common Writing Problems And The Best Ways To Avoid Them (2013)

by Ben Yagoda(Favorite Author)

3.84 of 5 Votes: 3

ISBN

1594488487 (ISBN13: 9781594488481)

languge

English

genre

Nonfiction

publisher

Riverhead Trade

review 1: Since I was an English major on my first trip through college, I consider myself a fairly accomplished writer. I see so many writing errors in blogs, articles, and reviews on-line, and I was looking forward to determining whether Yagoda's slim volume could be a good resource. It is definitely full of solid advice on how to recognize and avoid typical writing errors.The first section dedicates ~10 pages to the advice that reading, lots of reading, is the best training for writing well, and I couldn't agree more.The second section includes a review of proper style for numbers, abbreviations, capitalization, italics and punctuation. I laughed at the advice regarding semicolons: "If you feel like using a semicolon, lie down until the urge goes away." He then goes on to discuss... more word choice and the trap of similar words (threw and through, past and passed, etc.) Section 2 concludes with a fairly lengthy section on grammar.The third section relates to style - being concise and precise, avoiding cliches, resisting the overuse of jargon and euphemisms, and structuring sentences.Other reviewers have criticized the book for its brevity and lack of detail, however the author specifically states in the intro that "the book is mainly about the things that writing badly entails." It is NOT a comprehensive guide on all the rules of writing. Those books already exist on the desks of professional writers and editors. It simply focuses on the most frequently occurring errors in common usage these days. You will recognize some of these errors in your writing (as I did ).While the advice and examples in the book are certainly useful, and I enjoyed the breezy style and humor of the author, the format doesn't work well as a reference book. The Table of Contents refers to section titles that aren't always useful, and there is no index. So, if you wanted to look up proper use of semi-colons, you would have to scan through the TOC to try and spot that topic.Nevertheless, if you are looking for a quick review of typical writing errors to avoid, this 172 page book may be just the thing to help you move your writing to the next level.
review 2: Journalism professor Ben Yagoda attempts here what so many others have already tried: to present a short, enjoyable, and informative book on grammar and basic writing. The idea is not necessarily to make readers fantastic or even good writers but to make them not-bad, to allow them to rise above the current bulk of needlessly excessive writing and guard themselves against grammar they may not know or understand. And to a large extent, he succeeds.There are more conservative writers who would have everyone adhere to the current rules without exception or the expectation of change. William Strunk and E.B. White would fall into this category. There are also those who believe the rules should be followed but realize the futility of maintaining them all forever. Rules, words, and phrases all change over time. If a rule is misunderstood often enough, that common misunderstanding will likely become the next rule. And it is into this category that Yagoda falls as he anticipates and accepts the coming changes.While Strunk and White's guidebook may have been helpful decades ago (I believe it was first published in 1918 and updated in the 1950s), it has become outdated. Yagoda not only updates his book for more contemporary problems and references, he takes out the stuffiness that Strunk and White often pushed and replaces it with humor. He tersely remarks about committing errors by saying, "If you [make careless mistakes], it looks very bad and you will be mocked."For a beginner, this book should be a solid starting place. For more advanced writers, it will likely cover many rules they already know. Regardless, there were a few rules that surprised even me. Apparently, in most cases, it's not okay to use a comma after a sentence-opening conjunction (something I do frequently). You'll notice above that I've stopped doing this.Really, though, it was just nice to hear someone of such a high literary awareness speak so clearly, concisely, and realistically about writing. less

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