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savaging's review against another edition
4.0
Hugely useful book.
First of all, his name is Verlyn Klinkenborg. While you read it, you get to say things like "What in Verlyn Klinkenborg's name is going on here?!"
Secondly, he likes sentences. He never says he likes them. He instead asserts some authoritative all-knowledge about sentences. Like God wants good sentences, more than good behavior. And sure, what does Verlyn Klinkenborg know? But I like sentences too. I read a bad sentence and think: "you increase the unhappiness in the world."
This book is a tonic for those of us trained by academia to write bad sentences -- to stretch each sentence until it includes everything, to cram it with the jargon of 'logic,' to hook on a transition at the beginning and one on the end. Klinkenborg -- Verlyn Klinkenborg, that is, not that other Klinkenborg -- also snubs the over-clever wordsmithing of hook-yer-audience copy writers.
One needling discomfort: Klinkenborg (Verlyn) teaches how to write with confidence, authority, and trust in yourself and your reader. And he has these skills himself. His authoritativeness doesn't bother me -- I like to surrender myself to a strong writer. But . . . but writing . . . how can I put this? Everyone who writes about writing has to contradict themselves at least once a page. Because writing is strange and slippery and unbounded by rules. Verlyn Klinkenborg is no exception. But when he contradicts himself, he gets huffy. He says well yes it's this and it's also that and writing is contradictory so deal with it. This is only alarming because he's been so damn confident all along. If he confessed more to confusion, wonder, distress, ignorance, maybe he could let the contradiction rest there with its own weight and wisdom.
But if I'm so smart, why aren't I an editor for the New York Times?
First of all, his name is Verlyn Klinkenborg. While you read it, you get to say things like "What in Verlyn Klinkenborg's name is going on here?!"
Secondly, he likes sentences. He never says he likes them. He instead asserts some authoritative all-knowledge about sentences. Like God wants good sentences, more than good behavior. And sure, what does Verlyn Klinkenborg know? But I like sentences too. I read a bad sentence and think: "you increase the unhappiness in the world."
This book is a tonic for those of us trained by academia to write bad sentences -- to stretch each sentence until it includes everything, to cram it with the jargon of 'logic,' to hook on a transition at the beginning and one on the end. Klinkenborg -- Verlyn Klinkenborg, that is, not that other Klinkenborg -- also snubs the over-clever wordsmithing of hook-yer-audience copy writers.
One needling discomfort: Klinkenborg (Verlyn) teaches how to write with confidence, authority, and trust in yourself and your reader. And he has these skills himself. His authoritativeness doesn't bother me -- I like to surrender myself to a strong writer. But . . . but writing . . . how can I put this? Everyone who writes about writing has to contradict themselves at least once a page. Because writing is strange and slippery and unbounded by rules. Verlyn Klinkenborg is no exception. But when he contradicts himself, he gets huffy. He says well yes it's this and it's also that and writing is contradictory so deal with it. This is only alarming because he's been so damn confident all along. If he confessed more to confusion, wonder, distress, ignorance, maybe he could let the contradiction rest there with its own weight and wisdom.
But if I'm so smart, why aren't I an editor for the New York Times?
wolfbridge's review against another edition
fast-paced
4.0
One of the most useful books on prose I’ve ever read.
toboldlygoat's review against another edition
3.0
Some valuable insights and actionable advice, but overall pretentious and repetitive. His assumptions about what the reader has been taught about writing don't match my experience. Chapter 6 (critiquing sample sentences) was the most useful, except the examples where his snide commentary came down to "spell words correctly."
hamrickishere's review against another edition
4.0
2nd read.
The best advice books acknowledge that the best way to do something is to do something.
8/10
The best advice books acknowledge that the best way to do something is to do something.
8/10