100 Ways to Improve Your Writing: Proven Professional Techniques for Writing with Style and Power

Eleven sections make up this classic writers' manual. From writing a strong beginning to advice on style, grammar, punctuation and even lifestyle, Gary Provost gives us lots of help, in manageable chunks. And he's funny. One section on appealing to the reader is called "Twelve Ways to Avoid Making Your Reader Hate You." And in the chapter on wordiness, he offers us this example: "In preparing a list of professional people whose opinion I respect, you are one of the first that comes to mind. It it my objective to more fully utilize my management expertise than has heretofore been the case." Provost's 100 Ways is a clearly-written collection of classic snippets that can help you improve your writing a step at a time.

I've kept my yellowed, dog-eared copy close at hand since I bought it in the eighties. Provost's writing is direct and uncluttered and he quotes authors such as Hemmingway, Bradbury and Fitzgerald as models of effectiveness. His own examples are often hilarious - which means they'll stay with you for years. The 100 Ways are grouped by category to avoid a feeling of randomness. Sure, the book is 20 years old and you won't find a lot of techie pop-culture references in it (though somehow I doubt the author, now sadly passed on, were he writing today, would have veered much from his chosen style.) Buy it, learn from it. Keep it close by. (Provost's later book "Make Your Words Work" expands on many of the same ideas and includes exercises. Unfortunately, it's out of print and tough to find.)

Not too many times, after you've left school do you sit back and go through your writing critically, in order to improve it. I believe this book to have a quality unlike many others: it takes you by the hand, and if you give it the necessary time, and USE the tips given, you'll soon realise you're writing in ways you never thought possible. It teaches you how to be critical of your own work, how to listen to what you write, how to look at things from a different perspective (put yourself in your reader's shoes, for example). It has so many ways in which it can help yourself, and yet, with Provost's humor, you never grow tired of it. As of today, I'm past the middle of the book, and I have mixed feelings: on one side I don't want it to be over (I've just learned SO MUCH with it...) on the other I can't help to go through the rest of it to learn all that it has to offer (I guess I'll reread it later on, anyway!) I have not read such a small but helpful book in a long time. It might easily translate into the best spent 5 bucks ever, if you're into writing.

I use Gary Provost's 100 WAYS as the textbook in my Internet writing course (Personal Writing) for Lansing Community College. Students tell me, and I agree, that the organization of the book, its conversational tone, its concrete examples, and its unintimidating size and appearance are all features that make it a book they LOVE to read and will keep. It doesn't feel, look, or read like a textbook. Gary Provost's honesty about his own dislike for starting a writing assignment is disarming and important for students to see. Provost also makes readers comfortable with him when he admits the enormous risk inherent in writing a book about writing: He knows there must be thousands of readers just waiting to find an error in his work and to take two points off with a sharp red pencil!Finally, Provost's section on cliches is a delight. The entire section, which warns readers to avoid cliches, is written in a series of -- what else? -- cliches. Nice touch, and funnier than a crutch (oops)!Gary Provost is an artist, as are all good writers. The artist in Provost succeeds delightfully in this little book. 100 WAYS is Provost's Picasso-like sketch of Don Quixote with the windmill waiting in the distance to be overcome.Buy this book, use it, enjoy it, learn from it, teach with it, keep it.Dale M. Herder, Ph.D. Professor of English and Vice President Emeritus Lansing Community College Lansing, Michigan

What makes writing effective is its punch, its power, its ability to reach an invisible, long skinny finger into your soul and scratch awake a feeling. If you have to write--or speak--whether on your job, or you're tackling your "I should write a book," what should you do to make it good? Do you have two minutes? Pick up _100 Ways_, read one directive a day, think about it for 60 seconds, and get on with your work, integrating the new principles as you can. In three months, you'll be a better writer. Or thumb through the book to find and practice its most magical tricks, like "A man said," vs. "A county official said," from the two pages on using "specific nouns." If I could fantasize everyone I know--especially people trying to market their own businesses--into better communicators, I'd dream them into these five Provost guidelines: purpose, pyramids, transitions, wordiness and parallelism; then toss in for good measure: 12 ways to avoid making your readers hate you--all covered in less than 20 pages. The other 130 pages concisely address essentials from how to get started to where to put the commas. _100 Ways_ is as "quick and dirty" as you can get for sharp and clean writing.