Customer Reviews

A Writer's Guide to Eight Methods of Transition

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No wonder writing was so tedious and difficult in highschool and college. Teachers expected us to magically develop style while incorporating learned grammar via osmosis. Guess what? Style needs to be taught. This book is the answer, one of several by Pellegrino which is a must for writers of all ages, not just professors and professional authors, but for secondary students and also elementary teachers. It's never too soon to teach how to move from one paragraph to the next, how to begin a story: from the ending, the middle or the beginning, for a multitude of reasons and effects. This is a quick read and handy reference, neatly organized with short but well explained chapters with concrete, helpful examples.

I stumbled upon this little book - and Mr. Pellegrino's other books - here at Amazon.com and have been very glad I did. I write a lot (about 1800 pages last year) in the technical industry and this book was a launching pad to help me improve my transitions. In addition to this information, it is important to note that this book is best used with A Writer's Guide to Transitional Words and Expressions.

The two books complement each other very well; however, they are best implemented as two books - in my opinion. This book (using 8 methods of transition) is a read and shelf book. The book can be read and re-read, but it will not be heavily used as a reference. The other book (a writer's guide to transitional words and expressions) is already getting worn and I've had it for only a few months.

In the end, the two books work well together and are sure to spice up your writing. To be sure, these books are, without a doubt, the best solution to transitions in writing that I've encountered and, to amplify, allow me to state that I feel overwhemingly confident that you will enjoy these books. OK - so transitions can be over-employed...

I've been writing for more than fifty years - and the proper use of words still sends me to the books now and again. And again and again . . .

Victor Pellegrino had a marvelous idea: short books - almost booklets - helping out with some easily and often forgotten rules of writing. He has authored four of them so far. One is a guide to paragraphs, one on punctuation, another on transitional words and expressions and then this gem on using the eight methods of transition.

These books are useful to anyone who works with words, whether they be high school students or experienced writers needing an instant refresher.

Pellegrino concisely describes how to gracefully transition from one point to another using devices to indicate time order, sequence, comparison, contrasting, illustrating cause and effect and so on. The explanations are simple and concise and accompanied by example. Pellegrino is a fun author and all four of these books would make a great gift to a budding young writer.

He concludes with seven additional ways to connect ideas. He places special emphasis on pronoun reference, something that I often trip over.

These books are inexpensive, short and, above all, fun to peruse and helpful. Every writer should add these four slim volumes to their library.

Jerry

I could find nothing that provided more than a very basic insight into writing transitions.

Initially, I was impressed by the book's table of content (TOC). But, despite the exciting TOC, I found this book has not much to "say." For example, in the chapter of INDICATE CAUSE AND EFFECT, It provides one example of how to use the introductory adverb "therefore" in a sentence. Have you ever contructed a sentence like this: "Therefore, . . ." If you had, then this book is not right for you. I wouldn't consider it a book, it looked like a note. Beside, the content of it started at page 17 and ended at 53, so it contained only 37 pages, not 56 page as stated in the description section on Amazon.com.

Withing this small book you have "Transistional Words on how to Indicate Time Order, and How or When something Occurs in time, also To Indicate Sequence, To Repeat, To Provide an Example, To Conclude or Summarize, to Add a Point, To Connect Clauses, To Compare, To Indicate Cause and Effect. Also it has Pronoun References, Repeat Key Words, Word Substitution, End of Paragraph Transition, Beginning of Paragraph Transition all in 44 pages. There are several blank pages at the end for your Notes. I would also recomend along with buying this one to get A Writers Guide by Victor C. Pellegrino. This will definetely make you speech writing easier, Each one has an example to go along with it.

I have major writing problems related to my brain injuries. This is wonderful excellent guide for individuals who have difficulties transition from one paragraph to another paragraph. The author seems to understand the problems of transitioning writing. I highly recommend this book to anyone.