FaithWriters.com-Christian Writers Forum

glorybee wrote: Yikes, Shann! Hope I didn't step on your toes. Your opinions are as valid as mine, or Steve's, or Graham's, and this back-and-forth is how we get value from these sorts of discussions.

Ditto what Jan said. I should have summarized what you said about the opening more carefully.

When I first read your critique, I thought of 3 things: your number scores, what you said, and what you didn’t say. I know that you know that I graded written assignments for 10 years. However, contests are different, and I have only judged a few contests—maybe 3 or 4 and none at FW’s so take my tho...

Jan, I was going to throw my two cents in on Shann's post, but you beat me to it (which I'm glad of since you are the teacher and I'm just a lurker). I'll post my thoughts anyway since I already wrote them out. You'll notice that whereas you said that Graham's first sentence was passive, I said it w...

Thanks, Steve! I'm sure not going to argue with Merriam Webster. But just remember, the point of Mirriam Webster’s usage note is that they disagree with a whole camp of people who think myriad should NOT be a noun. This sort of looks like another example of language evolving and people fighting it....

I’ve never thought of the myriad question before. Here is a link for Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary. As you scroll down you will see an entry for “myriad” as a noun, including an interesting usage note, then an entry for “myriad” as an adjective. Since I have not thought about this before, I’ll...

Thanks. Just curious as to your practice. Your approach and mine are very similar vis-a-vis various levels of writing skill.

Jan, Begging the question is a logical fallacy in which someone assumes without proving part of what they need to prove for his argument to be valid. And, yes, you answered my question. Or at least I should say mostly. Part of what I was interested in was sort of a client management question. Do you...

I thought of another thing related to this topic; and I’d love your thoughts, Jan, as an editor. Language evolves, and there is a tendency to let incorrect usage become acceptable. I think of an example you gave and an example I gave, plus others. Your wrong definition of enormity is now showing up ...

I probably generally won’t participate in your classes, but anything I can do to drum up interest! (I hope you get to 10.) What about those pairs where the writer knows the difference perfectly well but the typo is so easy to make (and spellchecker won’t catch it)? The obvious example is angle vs. a...

Jan,

I'm so glad your wonderful lessons are still attracting students.

Since the respect issue keeps coming up, here’s my two cents. I mostly agree with Jan, but with a wrinkle. If one does not capitalize pronouns for God that does not show disrespect. That has been clearly established by Jan’s several posts. The reason this is true is because one is simply complying w...

I am a lawyer. I didn't mean "pegged incorrectly." I meant "pegged CORRECTLY."

And, yes, the website is for the public interest law firm that I run.

But now you're writing like a detective.

Oh man! I got pegged as a lawyer again! (Serves me right for trying to sound like a grammarian.)

But the SW really is a coincidence.

Zondervan has killed all its links for the Christian Writer's Manual of Style, as has (virtually?) everyone else. However, you can still get it. If you are interested, you should follow these directions AND save it ASAP. You can get it using the Internet archive, Wayback Machine. Go to http://archiv...

At the same time, we've adopted speech and grammar patterns that sound right, only by virtue of the fact that we've heard them so often we've become "tone-deaf" to the errors. Fine for dialogue, but not for prose or essays. I agree completely. Unfortunately, style guides are in dispute on...