Some Of My Favorite Books About Writing

	Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace, 9th edition. Joseph M. Williams. Longman, 2006. I love this book! If you can get only one book on writing clear, elegant sentences, this is it. This book has simple explanations and great examples. To get to the most important stuff, start on Chapter 3.
	Send: The Essential Guide to Email for Office and Home. David Shipley and Will Schwalbe, Knopf, 2007. This book is as fun to read as it is useful.
	Perfect Phrases for Resumes. Michael Betrus. McGraw Hill, 2005. This small book can save you hours of agony trying to come up with the right way to position your job experience.
	Resumes for Dummies, 5th edition. Joyce Lain Kennedy. Wiley, 2007. Make sure you know how to write and submit a resume using today’s technology. This book walks you through every step of the process and provides examples of winning resumes.
	Present Like a Pro: The Field Guide to Mastering the Art of Business, Professional, and Public Speaking. Cyndi Maxey and Kevin E. O’Connor. St. Martin’s Griffin, 2006. Packed full of great tips on every aspect of public speaking.
	Unstuck: A Supportive and Practical Guide to Working Through Writer’s Block.. Jane Anne Staw, Ph.D. St. Martin’s Press. 2003. If you’re really feeling blue about writer’s block, I guarantee relief after reading this book. I use her strategies all the time.
	Line by Line: How to Edit Your Own Writing.. Claire Kehrwald Cook. Houghton Mifflin Company. 1985. Indispensable. A bit tedious to get through, but no other book I know explains so clearly how to fix the wily sentence errors that creep into everyone’s prose-even the professionals.
	Elements of Style, 4th ed. William Strunk and E.B. White. Macmillan, 1999. A classic. Brief and beautifully written, it describes everything you need to know about style and craft and in the telling models elegant, simple writing. The book is also online.
	On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction. William Zinnser. HarperCollins, 2001. One of the best. I can open this book to any page and get inspired. Down-to-earth, practical advice for just about any kind of writing, including science, business, memoir, and sports.
	On Writer’s Block: A New Approach to Creativity. Victoria Nelson. Houghton Mifflin. 1993. A slew of great ideas to help break through your writer’s block. If none of them work, call The Writing Coach!
	Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life. Anne Lamott. Knopf. 1995. A humorous, honest account of the writing life. Lamott’s unpretentious, slice of life approach to her life teaches and entertains.
	Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within. Natalie Goldberg. Shambhala. 1986. 171 pp. A best seller, a fast read, and chock full of wonderful strategies whether you’re just thinking about writing or have been writing forever and need some inspiration.
	Acing the College Application, Michele A. Hernandez. Ballantine Books, 2002. If you can only buy one book on the subject, this is it. Everything you need to know about filling out the application, creating an activities list, and writing the essays by a former Dartmouth admissions officer.
	Simon and Schuster Handbook for Writers, 6th ed. Lynn Quitman Troyka. 2002. The grammar bible for many colleges and university writing programs. It’s really big and within lies everything you might ever need to know about grammar, punctuation, and research writing.
	A Pocket Style Manual, 5th edition. Diana Hacker. Bedford/St. Martin’s 2008. An ultra light, handy grammar reference you can toss in your briefcase or backpack (if you’ve been trying to lug around the Handbook for Writers you’ll appreciate this even more).
	The Business Writer’s Handbook, revised ed. Charles T. Brusaw, Gerald J. Alred & Walter E. Oliu. St. Martin’s Press. 2004. A compact, thorough handbook for every kind of business writing. It’s designed as a reference for professionals rather than as a textbook, so it’s wonderfully concise and practical.

Websites

Open for Success

Note to all you business owners: Being good at what you do and having great marketing materials aren’t enough for success! Working with a coach who truly understands what it takes can make all the difference. And Yota Schneider is the best.

http://owl.english.purdue.edu

Many universities have OWL’s (online writing labs). Purdue’s is one of the best.
You can get hundreds of handouts, templates, and examples on writing style, grammar,
business writing, and much more.

http://www.quintcareers.com/writing/writweb.html

A treasure trove of links to OWL’s and many other writing related sites.