Sin and Syntax
How to Craft Wicked Good Prose
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Narrated by:
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Coleen Marlo
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By:
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Constance Hale
About this listen
Today's writers need more spunk than Strunk: whether it's the Great American email, Madison Avenue advertising, or Grammy Award-winning rap lyrics, memorable writing must jump off the page. Copy veteran Constance Hale is on a mission to make creative communication, both the lyrical and the unlawful, an option for everyone.
With its crisp, witty tone, Sin and Syntax covers grammar's ground rules while revealing countless unconventional syntax secrets (such as how to use - gasp! - interjections or when to pepper your prose with slang) that make for sinfully good writing. Discover how to:
- Distinguish between words that are "pearls" and words that are "potatoes"
- Avoid "couch potato thinking" and "commitment phobia" when choosing verbs
- Use literary devices such as onomatopoeia, alliteration, and metaphor (and understand what you're doing)
Everyone needs to know how to write stylish prose - students, professionals, and seasoned writers alike. Whether you're writing to sell, shock, or just sing, Sin and Syntax is the guide you need to improve your command of the English language.
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Grammar! For many of us, the word triggers memories of finger-wagging schoolteachers, and of wrestling with the ambiguous and complicated rules of using formal language. But what is grammar? In fact, it's the integral basis of how we speak and write. As such, a refined awareness of grammar opens a world of possibilities for both your pleasure in the English language and your skill in using it, in both speech and the written word.
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Spectacular
- By Quaker on 09-24-16
By: Anne Curzan, and others
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Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue
- The Untold History of English
- By: John McWhorter
- Narrated by: John McWhorter
- Length: 5 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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A survey of the quirks and quandaries of the English language, focusing on our strange and wonderful grammar. Why do we say "I am reading a catalog" instead of "I read a catalog"? Why do we say "do" at all? Is the way we speak a reflection of our cultural values? Delving into these provocative topics and more, Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue distills hundreds of years of fascinating lore into one lively history.
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Great for casual linguists
- By Bertie on 01-11-10
By: John McWhorter
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Easy Spanish Step-by-Step
- By: Barbara Bregstein
- Narrated by: Rachel Story
- Length: 37 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Easy Spanish Step-by-Step is designed in such a way that each section builds upon the last to help your brain progressively create lasting and meaningful connections to each new word and grammar concept. Simply by listening and speaking out loud with us, you will naturally progress, step-by-step, toward Spanish communication and fluency.
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Best so far . . .
- By Medusa in Akron on 07-20-21
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Survival Theory
- A Preparedness Guide
- By: Jonathan Hollerman
- Narrated by: Jim Pelletier
- Length: 9 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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This preparedness guide will help you develop a plan to escape the deadly rioting and looting, showing you where you can take your family to keep them safe, even if you can't afford a fully-stocked survival retreat. Jonathan Hollerman's in-depth expertise and recommendations will cover many topics including bug-out bags, SHTF Weapons, tactical gear, survival tools, knives, long-term food storage, livestock, bug-out locations, survival retreat recommendations, and much more.
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Literally a half decent book.
- By LA on 09-29-16
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How to Boost Your Credit Score 100+ Points in 30 Days Without Credit Repair!
- By: Brian Diez
- Narrated by: Mike Norgaard
- Length: 55 mins
- Unabridged
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Did you know that you could have credit scores in the low 600s even if you never missed a bill payment in your life? That's because your payment history is only 35% of your credit score. How to Boost Your Credit Score 100+ Points in 30 Days Without Credit Repair will show credit industry secrets for maximizing the other 65%. The best part is you will see real results in just 30 days.
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Don't waste a credit on this!
- By typhoidtrish on 10-01-18
By: Brian Diez
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Great content!
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The Etymologicon is a completely unauthorized guide to the strange underpinnings of the English language. It explains: How you get from “gruntled” to “disgruntled”; why you are absolutely right to believe that your meager salary barely covers “money for salt”; how the biggest chain of coffee shops in the world (hint: Seattle) connects to whaling in Nantucket; and what precisely the Rolling Stones have to do with gardening.
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Maddening! Does not work as an audiobook!
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The best stories linger in the hearts and minds of readers for decades. These tales gain their power through plots that connect with the audience on both an emotional and intellectual level. Ronald B. Tobias details these 20 time-tested plots. Each is discussed and analyzed, illustrating how a successful plot integrates all the elements of a story. Tobias then reveals how to use these plots effectively in your own work.
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Wasteful
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Dull
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Ended up buying the paperback version
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Show, don't tell is probably the single most important piece of advice given to writers. But many writers struggle to understand this powerful principle or have difficulty applying it to their own work. Even experienced authors sometimes don't grasp the finer nuances of showing and telling. In this book, Sandra Gerth draws on her experience as an editor and a best-selling author to show you how to show and tell you when to tell.
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Type Hard. Type Fast. Make Dough. That was the formula of old-school pulp fiction—plot-driven, popular and gobbled up by a reading public hungry for more. And it produced many writers who hammered out a living selling “cash-and-carry” stories and novels. Some of these writers were among the best America has ever produced. Writers like Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett and John D. MacDonald. Others are numbered among the bestselling authors of all time, including Erle Stanley Gardner, Lester Dent, and Frederick Faust (better known by his pen name, Max Brand). What were the secrets of ...
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If you’re ready to write a cozy mystery, this book is for you! Writing a Cozy Mystery: Case Files is a practical guide that will take you through the process step-by-step. Understanding the many elements of a cozy mystery is like putting together a jigsaw puzzle. How do the sleuth, victim, villain, and suspects work together in the context of a cozy mystery plot? How do you mine the news for story ideas, and then mold them into something original? What are red herrings and how do you misdirect the reader while hiding the villain in plain sight? Writing a Cozy Mystery: Case Files, a Step-...
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Bad AI audio.
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What Editors Do
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Editing is an invisible art where the very best work goes undetected. Editors strive to create books that are enlightening, seamless, and pleasurable to read, all while giving credit to the author. In What Editors Do, Peter Ginna gathers essays from 27 leading figures in book publishing about their work. Representing both large houses and small, and encompassing trade, textbook, academic, and children's publishing, the contributors make the case for why editing remains a vital function to writers - and readers - everywhere.
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Deep Dive into The World of Editing
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Help! For Writers
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The craft of writing offers countless potential problems: The story is too long; the story's too short; revising presents a huge hurdle; writer's block is rearing its ugly head. In Help! For Writers, Roy Peter Clark presents an "owner's manual" for writers, outlining the seven steps of the writing process, and addressing the 21 most urgent problems that writers face. In his trademark engaging and entertaining style, Clark offers 10 short solutions to each problem.
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Good advice, but novelists beware
- By Robert Jason on 06-17-20
By: Roy Peter Clark
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Stylish Academic Writing
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- Narrated by: Virginia Wolf
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Stylish Academic Writing showcases a range of scholars from the sciences, humanities, and social sciences who write with vividness and panache. Individual chapters take up specific elements of style, such as titles and headings, chapter openings, and structure, and close with examples of transferable techniques that any writer can master.
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This is inspirational
- By M.Biblioswine on 03-11-20
By: Helen Sword
What listeners say about Sin and Syntax
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- Noctis
- 10-20-19
Prose
By far the Best audible book I have seen on Prose. The book starts by giving you a core sense of the language and grammar. It than shifts into addressing the language at a larger scale. Great book for beginning writers and veterans that want a refresher on the rules of the language and when to break them
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