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    Got Style?
    Got Style?
    Got Style?
    Ebook105 pages1 hour

    Got Style?

    By Helen Hardt

    ()

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    About this ebook

    Are your participles dangling? Can't get your tense sequencing right? Are you telling instead of showing?

    Helen Hardt takes you through the details you may have forgotten from English class and entertains you along the way. This little book is sure to be invaluable to both beginning and seasoned writers.

    Ms. Hardt is a professional editor of fiction. She counts among her clients New York Times Bestselling Authors, USA Today Bestselling Authors, RITA winners and finalists, and EPIC winners and finalists. She is also a #1 New York Times, #1 USA Today, and #1 Wall Street Journal bestselling author of romantic fiction..

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHelen Hardt
    Release dateOct 20, 2015
    ISBN9781311430038
    Got Style?
    Author

    Helen Hardt

    #1 New York Times, #1 USA Today, and #1 Wall Street Journal bestselling author Helen Hardt’s passion for the written word began with the books her mother read to her at bedtime. In addition to being an award-winning author of romantic fiction, she’s a mother, an attorney, a black belt in Taekwondo, a grammar geek, an appreciator of fine red wine, and a lover of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream. She writes from her home in Colorado, where she lives with her family. Helen loves to hear from readers. helenhardt.com

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      Book preview

      Got Style? - Helen Hardt

      Introduction

      got grammar?

      I admit up front that the name of this book is a bit of a misnomer. It is about style, yes, but it’s also about grammar. Frankly, I didn’t think anyone would actually buy a book called got grammar? I may be the only person in the free world who actually enjoys grammar. Nope, style sounds much more exciting. But to have good writing style, you must also have good grammar. That’s not to say that every style issue is a grammar issue; many are not. But good grammar is as essential to good writing style as egg whites are to chocolate mousse. So I’m going to touch on a lot of grammar in this book. After all, no one wants to read a paragraph full of showing rather than telling if it’s replete with grammatical errors. Not everyone is a grammar geek like I am, but let’s face it. If you want to be a professional writer, you need to know the rules of your language.

      "But that’s my editor’s job!"

      No, it’s your job. I can guarantee you that your editor is overworked and probably underpaid. The first thing he or she will ask when looking at your submission is, How much work is this going to be for me to edit? The story may be unique and amazing, but if the writing is a mess that will require hours upon hours upon hours of harrowing work, the editor will pass. Submitting a clean and well-crafted manuscript is your best chance of getting published.

      "But I selfpublish, so that scenario doesn’t apply to me."

      Au contraire, writing clean is even more important if you selfpublish, especially if you choose to forego professional editing—which I don’t recommend. Since selfpublishing became the rage, a rash of poorly written books have been thrust upon innocent readers. If you want yours to stand out, it has to be great. After all, you don’t want a grammar geek like me going at it with a mental red pen.

      Okay, off the soapbox.

      This book was born of my writing workshops on grammar and style. I wasn’t kidding about the mental red pen. Ask any editor; it’s nearly impossible not to correct as you read. I began to notice certain errors that were very common in published work—dangling modifiers, cumulative v. coordinate adjective errors, transitive v. intransitive verb errors, to name a few. Don’t know what those are? We’ll get to that. Anyway, it occurred to me that not only are a lot of authors uneducated in some of the finer nuances of grammar and style, but some editors are too. It’s impossible to know everything about English. Languages constantly evolve, and very few grammar and style rules are absolute. But hopefully this book will help both authors and editors—and anyone else who’s interested—re-learn some of the finer points that have been long forgotten from English class.

      Make no mistake. This book is not a substitute for The Chicago Manual of Style or any other good grammar reference. I’m including only those areas where I continually see errors in published

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