Fifteen or twenty years ago, self-publishing was looked on as a last resort option for books that a publisher wouldn’t want to take on. It was also an expensive and time-consuming way to get a book out there. Self-publishers had to pay for a whole print run – maybe 1,000 or 2,000 copies – and … Read more
Two words that sometimes get confused are “disparate” and “desperate”. They have quite different meanings, but they can sound very similar in some accents, and if you’re using autocorrect, you might find that you get the wrong one. What Does “Disparate” Mean? Disparate is an adjective that refers to things that are separated in some … Read more
The English language has countless ways to say “Great!” or “Cool!” When people want to sound au courant, fashionable, trendy, or with-it, they often choose slang words that are currently popular in their culture – very informal, unconventional words that may not be found in standard dictionaries, but have a freshness and color that may … Read more
Whether you enjoy writing or not, there’s probably a fair amount of it that you have to do as a student. I don’t think essays are anyone’s favourite thing to write (and I say that as a former English Literature student!) … but by honing your writing process, you can get them over and done … Read more
Previous posts on this website have discussed syntactical errors that result in a lack of grammatical balance between equivalent words and phrases; this post lists the various types of mistakes that lead to flawed parallel structure. You are invited to fix each sentence before reading the explanation. Absence of One Word Most sentences with faulty … Read more
When you advise someone, you give advice. One is a verb, the other is a noun. And where does advice come from? Good advice is offered by advisers/advisors. The spelling is the only difference between those two words, and usually adviser and advisor mean the same thing. Spelling it with an e is more common, … Read more