Writing-tips newsletter

The Better Writing Skills newsletter

The Better Writing Skills monthly newsletter is free, informative and covers writing-related topics of wide interest.

Subscribe or unsubscribe here
(This link will open a new window.)

You will not receive any unsolicited e-mail by subscribing or unsubscribing. My word on it. -- Tim N.

Please be sure to add newsletter@betterwritingskills.com to your spam filter to ensure you receive your copy.

Your first issue will arrive early next month, but you can immediately browse the recent issues by clicking the links below.

Free chapters

Download Scribe's free apostrophes chapter.

Download Scribe's free plain English chapter.

Download Scribe's free report writing chapter.

Recent issues

(If you wish to link to these newsletters, please link to this page, not the individual newsletters. The reason for this request is that the newsletters are just plain text and don't contain any links back to this page. Thanks.)

June 2009:

Does "brother in law" need hyphens?
Should we use a colon-dash?
The excitement of subject-verb agreement. Woohoo!

May 2009:

Do we leave a space in "10 a.m."?
More on bulleted lists
Can "latter" be used with more than two choices?

April 2009:

Can I end a sentence with a preposition?
Quoting versus paraphrasing
Punctuating bulleted lists

March 2009:

What is the plural of names like "Smith" and "Jones"?
Using fewer acronyms (continued)
More on "who" versus "whom"

February 2009:

Free material on report writing, apostrophes and plain English
Do place names always need a capital letter?
How can we use fewer acronyms?

December 2008:

"Its being" or "it being"?
Formatting a manuscript for publication
Can we shorten a sentence by omitting "that"?
"That" or "which"?

November 2008:

One word or two? How do we know?
Is your dictionary past its use-by date?
More on writing numbers as words
"Attain" versus "obtain"

October 2008:

Improving your writing: advice from a reader
When do we write numbers as words?
Why do we write some numbers as words?
Should I use single quotes or double quotes?

September 2008:

Should we "talk to the slides"?
How can I improve my writing?
Is Google a poor way to make decisions about English usage?

August 2008:

"Program" or "programme"?
"Lookup" or "look up", and "backup" or "back up"?
More on "shall" versus "will"
Another way to avoid saying "he or she"

July 2008:

The vexing issue of when to use "he".
What do "vis-a-vis" and "inter alia" mean?
Is your e-mail mistaken for spam?

June 2008:

Choosing between "I shall" and "I will"
Ten tips for writing good sales copy
Is it okay to say "and so"?

May 2008:

What are those brackets for?
An alternative to "office timings"?
Should we say "the team is" or "the team are"?