Practical and empowering lessons, built around examples from expert writers, give students the tools to craft rhetorically successful sentences. The chapters guide students through the techniques and strategies necessary to understand and achieve stylistic effects, using illustrations and models from the brief anthology at the back of the book.
A brief anthology of readings by accomplished writers provides a source for examples and exercises, as well as inspiration for students. Ten model texts by distinguished writers in multiple genres, such as Barack Obama, Oliver Sacks, Amy Tan, and Drew Gilpin Faust, show rather than tell students what attention to style can do for them. Headnotes for each reading highlight and explain the authors' stylistic choices.
Integrated exercises offer hands-on practice with a variety of sentence styles. Student-reviewed exercises, integrated throughout the chapters, ask students to analyze passages, to imitate sentence structures, to develop and combine sentences, and to edit others' work as well as to apply what they've learned to their own writing.
A glossary of helpful terms collects and defines the grammatical terminology boldfaced throughout the book.