C. Edward Good

This book is good. I feel that since I read it that I should have fantastic grammar and punctuation now. To have anything else would make me feel somewhat guilty. I will probably still make the same mistakes as before though.

The book starts out with describing the eight parts of speech and what they do. All words in English can be categorized into eight different compartments. Those are nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, pronouns, conjunctions, prepositions, and interjections. In the first eight chapters he goes and describes each one and defines them for you. Further on in the book he becomes more specific with mistakes and errors that people make in word usage. The book finally ends on describing punctuation.

Very useful and sometimes entertaining, this deserves to be on the shelf of any person that does some type of writing for a living. The only big problem with this book is that it can't be carried in your pocket.… (meer)

For some time now, I've wanted to find a book, rather textbook in nature, that is essentially an old school primer type piece that strictly covers grammar. I told myself not to actively search one out, as the right one would show up at the right time. Good's book is exactly what I was looking for. The book is very dry and straightforward, as he makes note of in the preface. Good states that although this is pretty boring stuff, it still is necessary to know, particularly now that all of our lives are consumed by media and the necessary literacy. Part one of the book deals with the eight major parts of speech, and these eight chapters consume almost half of the book. From here we head into phrases, clauses, verbs as adjectives, verbs as nouns, verbs as anything, all that active vs passive goodness that drives most insane but makes me smile. From here, the text goes into 'common' mistakes, aka the grammar on social media sites that makes me want to break phones and tablet monitors. "Your going to the store huh? Get me some of there boudin they sale. Mom wants some to. Thanks." The final part delves into punctuation, from commas to brackets to the lowly colon. There are countless rules thrown in over the course of this book, most done with a touch of humor. I've used this book for reference over the semester, and once I pick it up it's very hard to put down. It's just fun. Many argue that these rules aren't as important as they once were and that it's a waste of precious instructional time to dwell on something so tedious. I say boo to that. It's imperative to know what's fundamentally correct, especially as writing totally consumes us at this point in time.… (meer)

The author relies too heavily on irritating self-deprecating humor, but the book is a useful and easy-to-understand guide to grammar. Despite all his self-congratulation about how few "to be" verbs he uses (and why this makes the book better and less boring), the author repeats himself. A lot. If you ask me, that's also a recipe for boredom. But in general a pretty useful guide. I now know how to use that and which properly; the difference has mystified me for years, and I think I finally get it.… (meer)