All Blog Posts Tagged 'help' (48)

As I prep and get ready mentally for my book launch in November. I am humbled at all of the support I have received from colleagues, friends, family and general consumers. When you decide to launch a book that tells your true life twists and turns, you have to be ready and receptive for the feed back, good or bad. My book focus is about my personal story of overcoming broken homes, abusive bosses, injurious relationships and financial hardship to build my own successful staffing business and…

“Your writing bores me.” “I am bored by your writing.”

Not only do these two sentences demonstrate the difference between the active and passive voice but also they communicate a central reason for avoiding the passive voice.

In the active voice, the subject of the sentence does the action described by the main verb. Thus, the subject is active. In the passive voice, the action is done to the subject. Thus, the subject is passive. Passive voice is a problem for direct writing…

Active and Passive Voice: When you are active, you do something. When you are passive, things happen to you. This is the same concept as the active and passive voice in sentences.

In the active voice, the subject performs the action described by the main verb. In the passive voice, the action described by the main verb is done to the subject.

Example D.1a, active voice: “The service…

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: Where you add or leave out a comma can change the meaning of a sentence.

Let’s look at a news story I read this morning to learn how a comma before “including” changes the meaning of the sentence. In this example, I think the writer left out a comma, thus communicating something that probably isn’t true.

“The Chicago Teachers Union has [sic] announced that it will send a bus to the 50th Anniversary March on Washington, a…

As I am new here, it would be quite useful to have a tidy and ordered introduction as to who I am and what I do. This is especially true since, as a publisher, I do things a tad different than others and do not wish to be misunderstood in any way.

So let's start with some non-business type information. I, Kyle Davis, am an author, artist, programmer, and of a few other oddball professions. I'm always interested in learning new things and have found that such an…

Fantasy author Tania Elizabeth is asking for help raising funds for the Starlight Children's Foundation. Click here to learn more about this worthy cause: http://empyricaltales.blogspot.com/2013/04/guest-post-starlight-childrens-aid.html

You have written your book. Now what? If you decide on self publishing you do have options.

Option 1:You can send the publisher your book as a word document. The publisher can format and layout your work and then make print copies.  

Option 2: This option is not recommended for the novice author/writer. You can decide to do your own editing, formatting and page layout and send to your publisher your entire book files in PDF format. The PDF file/s must be an exact trim size of…

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars LIFE CHANGING BOOK!,…

Commas are confusing because they are used in many ways. However, the basic principle to using commas is simple: Use commas to separate clauses and phrases within sentences that have their own meaning.

The “rules” for commas below are broadly, but not universally, accepted. However, a careful writer considers two central issues:

• Reader understanding and
• Consistency.…

You have two adjectives together. Do you or don’t you put a comma between them? If they are coordinate adjectives, you do. This follows Zen Comma Rule P.

Comma Rule P: Put a Comma between Coordinate Adjectives.

Definition of Coordinate Adjectives. Adjectives are…

Dlite Press

This no-nonsense text offers strategies for dealing with life after high school. The guide explains positive and negative traits that can help or hinder teens in their post high school life and gives readers tips to identify the path to success and avoid the route that often leads to failure. Available…

Concise writing is clear writing. By definition, concise writing communicates in as few words as necessary. Everything in a sentence other than the subject, verb, and object is description. Descriptions cause most of the “fluff” in sentences, but, fortunately, some simple strategies will help you write concise descriptions.

Simplifying…

What are nominalizations?

Nominalizations are the noun forms of action verbs, as seen here:

Sample action verbs - Corresponding nouns

illustrate – illustration

fail – failure

react – reaction

announce – announcement

increase (v.) – increase (n.) 

Why are they bad, and how do I fix them?

Nominalizations have…

Active and Passive Voice: When you are active, you do something. When you are passive, things happen to you. This is the same concept as the active and passive voice in sentences.

In the active voice, the subject performs the action described by the main verb. In the passive voice, the action…

When I was in college, I worked behind the front desk of a major hotel. Directly across the lobby was the hotel bar, a small, dark lounge with the bar counter on the opposite side and a stage at one end. George Thorogood, when he stayed at the hotel, would sit at the far end of the counter, next to the stage. 

Connie, the bartender, once told me that her job was to…

The basic principal for writing about complex subjects is to do the work necessary so that the reader can understand you easily. Of course, your first task is to make sure you understand your own ideas. As Einstein said, “If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.” With this in mind, here are three strategies to help you write clearly about complex…

Before I write anything else, let me state that I like Lynn Truss’s book Eats, Shoots and Leaves. It is funny, and it has a few good pointers on…

Therefore and Too are conjunctive adverbs, and they cause a lot of problems with commas. Before we look at using commas with therefore and too, we need to understand conjunctive adverbs and what they do.

What Conjunctive Adverbs Do

A conjunctive adverb shows how the idea in one sentence or independent clause…

You have a document, and it has special formatting. Perhaps it has heading styles, block quotes, references, and the like. Maybe you need to use APA style or MLA style. Perhaps your document has special chapter titles. Keeping track of these styles—and using them consistently—can…