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    Punctuate with Perfection: Master Punctuation so You Can Produce Clearer, More Professional, and More Authoritative Writing Using Easy-to-Read Explanations and Techniques
    Punctuate with Perfection: Master Punctuation so You Can Produce Clearer, More Professional, and More Authoritative Writing Using Easy-to-Read Explanations and Techniques
    Punctuate with Perfection: Master Punctuation so You Can Produce Clearer, More Professional, and More Authoritative Writing Using Easy-to-Read Explanations and Techniques
    Ebook125 pages1 hour

    Punctuate with Perfection: Master Punctuation so You Can Produce Clearer, More Professional, and More Authoritative Writing Using Easy-to-Read Explanations and Techniques

    By Anthony Kelleher

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    About this ebook

    Punctuate with Perfection will bring you from your current level of punctuation ability to perfection. Would you like to write in a clearer, more authoritative fashion? Do you want to know exactly how to use colons, semicolons, dashes, and hyphens? This book can help you answer all these questions and more.
    This book is a modern guide which doesn’t get overly technical with jargon or complex explanations. Yet it is detailed and thorough, so you can acquire the confidence of using all the punctuation explained within. Every punctuation mark is shown in action using interesting and varied examples. There are also exercises to complete, which will help ingrain each punctuation mark and its uses.

    In this book, you’ll learn:

    • how to write more clearly by selecting the right punctuation mark for its intended purpose.

    • how to never again appear sloppy or amateurish in your written English.

    • the exact function and uses of the colon, the semicolon, the apostrophe, scare quotes, single quotes, double quotes, parentheses, the em-dash, the en-dash, the hyphen, and many more common punctuation marks.

    • the many second and third uses of common punctuation marks.

    Plus much more.

    Free resources for learning English -> SirEnglish.com

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAnthony Kelleher
    Release dateMar 6, 2017
    ISBN9781370485925
    Punctuate with Perfection: Master Punctuation so You Can Produce Clearer, More Professional, and More Authoritative Writing Using Easy-to-Read Explanations and Techniques
    Author

    Anthony Kelleher

    Anthony Kelleher is from London, England. He has been teaching both English Language and English as a Foreign Language for more than 10 years. He studied Linguistics & TESOL at the University of Roehampton in London and has a keen interest in all areas of English education.Anthony has written several books on the English language and publishes in this field regularly.

    Read more from Anthony Kelleher

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    Book preview

    Punctuate with Perfection - Anthony Kelleher

    First of all, I must congratulate you for wanting to improve your punctuation and become a better writer in English. Punctuation matters, as it can mean the difference between someone thinking, Wow! This work is extremely polished and professional to someone thinking, This is really sloppy work.

    To judge people based purely on punctuation is wrong, but the fact is that it happens. When we read a book, an article, or a blog post with spelling and punctuation errors, this sticks in our mind and affects how we receive the message. Your writing and your message might be exceptional, but poor punctuation won’t allow that to shine.

    On the other hand, writing without any errors in spelling and punctuation allows us to fully absorb the message that the writer intended. This is the key to punctuation: it shouldn’t draw attention to itself; it shouldn’t be used just for the sake of it. Punctuation should aid comprehension of the writer’s message, but do no more. It’s the unsung hero of writing.

    Perhaps you are a professional writer or you enjoy writing as a hobby. Maybe you are a student who writes a lot of essays. Or perhaps you are simply interested in mastering punctuation to enhance your English skills. Whatever your situation, your goal is the same: to master punctuation and be able to use it effectively. This is exactly what you are going to learn in this book.

    Some people view punctuation as the dull part of writing and learning English. I believe punctuation is actually quite fascinating. It’s all around us, everywhere we look, in books, on road signs, in magazines, in instruction manuals, in restaurant menus, etc. Yet we never really think about it until we notice a glaring mistake or when we want to consciously improve in this area.

    Obviously you want to improve, and that’s exactly what this book will help you to do. I wrote this book in as casual a way as possible, and everything is explained in a clear, concise manner. There are lots of examples for you to look at and study, and exercises are provided at the end of each section.

    Join me on the journey of mastering punctuation, and you’ll soon realize that punctuation can be as interesting as any other part of the English language.

    How to use this book

    This book starts with some simple, common punctuation marks, such as the period (or full stop), the question mark, and the exclamation mark. It then progresses onto more challenging and commonly misused marks, like commas, apostrophes, hyphens, dashes, and parentheses.

    Feel free to skip ahead to the more challenging punctuation, but I suggest you read from beginning to end so you have a thorough and precise understanding of every punctuation mark covered.

    There are exercises at the end of most sections to help you internalize the uses of the punctuation marks. Answers are also provided underneath the exercises, so be sure to avoid looking at them before you complete the tasks.

    To aid learning, lots of example sentences are used. Any incorrect sentences that are used are marked with an asterisk (*) so you know they are badly punctuated. All examples are italicized so that they are easily distinguishable from the main text.

    Some punctuation marks differ slightly in their usage between the UK and the USA. I have noted any major differences in this book, so wherever you are from you can choose the appropriate style for you.

    The Period (Full Stop)

    No punctuation book would be complete without starting with the good old period (or full stop as it is known in some countries).

    The period (.) is one of the most commonly used punctuation marks and causes people very few problems. The period is primarily used to mark the end of a sentence. Here are some examples:

    The sun rises in the east and sets in the west.

    While I sometimes enjoy eating meat, I prefer vegetables.

    I need just two things from the supermarket: some ice cream and a spoon to eat it with.

    Simple enough, right? You would think that it’s very difficult to make a mistake with a period, but upon reading hundreds of online blogs, Facebook posts and sometimes even newspaper articles, you might be surprised to know that it can be used incorrectly. Here is one typical example of incorrect usage:

    * My friend just got a tattoo of a dragon on his back, John wants one too.

    What is wrong with the above sentence? The problem is that a comma is separating the two statements, when in fact this is not sufficient. What’s needed instead is a period.

    My friend just got a tattoo of a dragon on his back. John wants one too.

    This is much better, because both of the statements now have their own period. You could also simply use the word and in place of the period.

    My friend just got a tattoo of a dragon on his back, and John wants one too.

    Here are some other examples of similar punctuation errors where a period or a connecting word is needed, but is omitted in place of a comma:

    * Google is coming under fire for not paying sufficient taxes in certain countries, the UK is one country which is reviewing the company.

    * Martin has been dating Mary

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