I’ve always had a very laissez-faire approach to punctuation; if it looks right, it probably is. Which is also how I end up using too! many! exclamation! points!
The Accidental Apostrophe is supposed to help with those problems. Subtitled “And Other Misadventures in Punctuation”, Taggart uses a conversational tone to discuss the uses and rules of punctuation. The book is fun – everything from the writing style to the examples chosen suggests Taggart enjoys the topic and the writing process.
Now for the most important question: did it help improve my grammar?
I think it could, if I started to memorise the rules. The trickiest punctuation topics, for me, are the comma, the semicolon, and the em-dash. Taggart explains them well, and with enough examples that I understand, but I’m not sure if reading this once will help to override years of “just do whatever looks right”. I suppose it’s a good thing that I own this book because I should probably read it a few more times.
This is a short review because there’s not much to talk about when it comes to a book about grammar. I thought it was an enlightening and enjoyable read and I definitely have to reread it sometime in the future to retain what I’ve just learnt!
I actually enjoy books like this. I’ll add it to my tbr. I think books like these help, especially if it’s written in an engaging way to make a boring topic interesting.
I think commas are the hardest to pin down. My day job is spent puzzling out grammar and punctuation and commas are one of the most annoying things.
I just use commas whenever I feel like them, haha! I’ll probably reread this book sometime! Hope you enjoy it if you pick it up (:
Personally, I think commas do allow for some artistic leeway. There are places where you are really supposed to have a common, according to the rules. But I think you can add some additional ones, if you wish, to indicate how you want the text to be read.
That is true! I normally put a comma every time I would want to take a breath or to mark a sentence fragment that could be omitted, but that may result in too many commas.
This sounds like a fun non-fiction!
It was! I’ll probably reread it sometime and hopefully my grammar will continue to improve haha