CliffsQuickReview Writing: Grammar, Usage, and Style [Paperback]

Jean Eggenschwiler (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0822053675 | ISBN-13: 978-0822053675 | Publication Date: March 14, 1997 | Edition: 1st

CliffsQuickReview course guides cover the essentials of your toughest classes. Get a firm grip on core concepts and key material, and test your newfound knowledge with review questions.

Whether you're new to nouns, verbs, and prepositions or just brushing up on your grammar, CliffsQuickReview Writing: Grammar, Usage, and Style can help. This guide not only helps you understand grammar concepts, but it also gives you clear explanations of sentence structure, as well as advice on how to write well. As you work your way through this guide, you'll find out about

• Nouns, verbs, pronouns, adjectives, and adverbs
• Propositions, conjunctions, and interjections
• Sentence construction and variety, as well as punctuation
• Words: compound words, idioms, clichés, and jargon
• The different types of writing and organizing a writing assignment

CliffsQuickReview Writing: Grammar, Usage, and Style is an invaluable reference for those who want to improve their writing, whether at the high school level or in college. Here are just a few of the things you'll learn about how to bring your writing up to snuff:

• Understanding your writing assignment
• Writing a thesis statement
• Quoting and paraphrasing, and avoiding plagiarism
• Creating an outline for your paper
• Writing your first draft, and polishing up your final draft

With titles available for all the most popular high school and college courses, CliffsQuickReview guides are a comprehensive resource that can help you get the best possible grades.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Cliffs Quick Reviews are Produced by The People Who Know Student Needs and Respond to Them. This logically presented, easy-to-grasp review gives you the reference you want in order to write effectively for any course requiring you to put your ideas down on paper. This Review Gives You

• A concise Grammar Review that clearly explains the parts of speech, with special emphasis on how to keep errors out of your writing.
• A Sentence Review that shows you how to avoid common mistakes in such areas as agreement, modification, and parallel structure.
• A Punctuation Review that demystifies the use of periods, question marks, exclamation points, commas, semicolons, colons, dashes, parentheses, and quotation marks.
• A Words section that makes it easy to understand the meanings of frequently confused words, to use idioms correctly, and to identify and avoid cliches, euphemisms, and wordiness.
• A Writing section that takes you through the process of becoming a good writer—writing for various purposes, selecting your topic, formulating your main idea, gathering supporting details, organizing your writing, and writing from the first draft through the final paper.

About the Author

Jean Eggenschwiler, MA is a graduate of U. C. Berkeley and Stanford University. She has taught English and Composition in high school and worked as a business editor and writer. Emily Dotson Biggs is a graduate of the University of North Carolina and Murray State University. She is currently an adjunct instructor at Paducah Community College and Murray State University and has taught English to students from kindergarten to college. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 101 pages
• Publisher: Cliffs Notes; 1st edition (March 14, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0822053675
• ISBN-13: 978-0822053675
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,609,477 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent!, June 9, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Writing: Grammar, Usage, and Style (Cliffs Quick Review) (Paperback)

After being out of college for twenty years, I wanted to review basic grammar and punctuation. So, I ordered a copy of this book -- Writing: Grammar, Usage, and Style -- by Cliffs Quick Review. In a word, it was just what I was looking for, a clear and concise review of English grammar. Although the book is 240 pages long, it has just the right amount of detail and examples without overdoing it. One can read it from front to back (as I am doing) without getting too bogged-down in detail. Or, the work could serve as a ready reference guide to basic grammar and punctuation. It's not just for students, but for anyone who wants to improve their writing skills. Highly recommended!

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A good all-reund guide to grammar and better writing style, January 6, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: CliffsQuickReview Writing: Grammar, Usage, and Style (Paperback)

This is a practical, easy-to-use guide to grammar and better writing, full of good examples. The reader does not have to wade through the dread grammar jargon (predicate-nominative, etc) that turns so many students off and makes them think grammar is irrelevant to their lives.

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful Book, April 20, 2005

By 

carin "carin" (Mass.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Writing: Grammar, Usage, and Style (Cliffs Quick Review) (Paperback)

I disagree with the previous reviewer. For one thing, the reader inaccurately assumes this book is in the same genre as the Gregg Reference Manual. The Cliffs book is intended for basic writers who need the core basics of a Freshman ENG 101 course from research to revision. It is not intended as any sort of intensive grammar review or grammar dictionary. To use it as such or frankly to expect a Cliffs book (the publisher should be a tip off to the genre, level, and intended audience) to do more than that is naieve at best. The reader also places excessive faith in a book that is by no means the industry standard or even a particularly well liked by those in the profession. As a tenured and distinguished English professor at a top ten university with twenty six years of experience in teaching writing, I think I am qualified to say with authority that Gregg is not the definitive anything. For what the Cliffs book intends- to provide a comprehensive and brief introduction to the basics of college writing for individuals with little to no previous experience and even less confidence- I think it exceeds expectations. Many of my students have improved their writing using this book.