I like to share good things with others, especially writers.

 Bobbie Christmas, editor and writer in Atlanta, GA has written some great books on how to write well. I have used "Purge Your Prose of Problems" for a number of years and can't praise the book enough.

All writers need to know how to write dialogue and this book has four pages about when and how to use it, as well as the proper punctuation for writing dialogue. Did you know you should give each speaker his/her own paragraph? Most of my students don't know that.


Recently I purchased another book by Bobbie Christmas. "Write in Style" is amazing! It has tons of good tips on ways to use the computer to help you edit your work.

Bobbie's trademarked Find and Refine method has been a great tool in finding the words I use too often in my writing. Two of those words are so and just. With Bobbie's Find and Refine Method, it was easy to make the needed adjustments to my manuscript. Because I use those two words in my everyday speech, I don't notice how often I use them in my writing.

I get no remuneration for recommending these books. I have only met Bobbie one time, but I find her books such a help I urge all of my writing students to add them to their library.

Order on Amazon.com:

Write in Style: Using Your Word Processor and Other ...

www.amazon.com › … › Writing, Research & Publishing Guides

Author Bobbie Christmas teaches writers like us how to use the Find function on our word processors to track down and eliminate unstylish usages and write tighter, stronger sentences. Not only that, she is witty, clever and easy to read. She doesn't hesitate to poke fun at herself, which makes her teachings easy to swallow.

PRONOUNS - Mistakes we make in our writing

One of the biggest problems beginning and even more experienced writers have is the misuse of pronouns.

Figure this one out: Nancy sat beside Jane. She took her hand. (Who reached for whose hand?)

When used properly, the pronoun modifies the last stated noun. See this example taken from Bobbie Christmas’ book, Write in Style.

I found a dog on the street. It was cold and wet. (The it in the last sentence says the street was cold and wet) If the writer wanted us to know the dog was cold and wet, he would have written it this way: I found a cold, wet dog on the street.


He might have written this: On the street I found a dog. It was cold and wet. (You can see the adjectives cold and wet refers to the dog in these sentences.


Personal pronouns modify the last stated name in the sentence. John and Jake headed for the super market. He wanted to buy beans. (Who is He referring to, John or Jake?)

Jake is the last stated name so He, in the next sentence, is referring to Jake. Better ways to write this sentence: John and Jake headed for the supermarket to buy beans. John and Jake headed to the supermarket. Jake wanted to buy beans.