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The Better Writing Skills newsletter

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Recent issues

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February 2010:

Should "Dear John" be followed by a comma?
Are you "cleverer" or "more clever" than me?
Young people today don't speak no good at all!

December 2009:

"Sounds like" or "sounds as if"?
Disoriented or disorientated?
"Different from", "different to" or "different than"?

November 2009:

Ten years of newsletters
Are "accomplishment" and "achievement" different?
Do I use a question mark with a polite request?
"In the same vein" or "in the same vain"?

October 2009:

Do we use a comma with "and"?
When do we say "how many" instead of "how much"?
What's the passive voice, and why should I care?

September 2009:

Does "email" need a hyphen?
Should I use "will be" or "would be"?
Does "focused" have one "s" or two?

August 2009:

One word or two? Is there a general rule?
"Online" or "on-line"?
Do job titles need a capital letter?

July 2009:

"Mine and Joe's car"?
"Having said that" and "Having said this"
When do we capitalise "state" and "federal"?

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?