Painless Grammar

Rebecca Elliott has created a very accessible grammar book. She gave good down-to-earth explainations for grammar rules. There are a lot of paired examples of wrong usages and correct usages. Coverage includes common grammar issues, punctuations, and procedures of self-editing.

I originally bought this book for my grade school age son. Months later, I began to write a series of fictional accounts of various things. This small book has been at my side constantly. It is an easy to use, well referenced little wonder of a tomb. I find the multiple examples helpful. It does the basic brush of grammar quite painlessly, as advertised. I am a college educated woman with more than eight years of post-graduate education. Yes, I have purchased a second copy for my son. He's not getting mine!

What I like about this book is it's easy to use. When you need help with grammar just look it up in the handy index. Yes this is a book on "basic" grammar, but isn't that what troubles the average Joe/Jane Blow in his or her everyday writing.The beauty of this book is its simplicity. Adults can benefit from Dr. Elliot's humorous approach used to keep eigth graders from falling asleep between reading about nouns and verbs.The best way to describe this book is it's a kids version of Strunk and Whites, "Elements of Style."

As a retired high school teacher of 10th and 11th grades, I wish I had had this resource for my students. More formal usage books are not only colder and more frightening-looking but are usually much less functional than this book in actually helping the student to write clearly and well. I wish that I had written it!

If there is a way to make grammar painless, Dr. Elliott has done it. This book is delightful. My teenagers aren't even intimidated by fact it is a grammar book. It stays by our computer for every writing project, even mine.