Active and Passive Verbs
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Every sentence has a verb.
Verb choice is important and can strongly impact the readers' understanding as well
as their motivation to keep reading.
Powerful, strong, and vivid verbs "show" rather than just "tell" what's happening.
They help us to visualize or see the scene in our minds.
Verbs of being indicate the state (or condition) of something.
Verbs of being include am, is, was, were, be, being, and been.
A verb phrase is often made up of a verb of being used as a helping verb with a main
verb.
Avoid overusing verbs of being and –ing verb phrases.
Use verb forms that can stand alone to make your writing more powerful–to "show"
rather than "tell" what is happening.
The way we write a sentence is just as important as what we write.
Sentences can be written in either active or passive voice.
The active voice indicates that the subject does (or performs) the action of the verb.
The passive voice indicates that the subject receives the action (or is acted upon by
the verb). It usually includes a helping verb of being with the past participle form of
a verb. It may include a by phrase telling who or what does or performs the action
of the verb.
Sentences are usually more powerful when written in active rather than passive
voice. Active voice helps readers better understand and visualize what's happening.
Passive voice can be effective when you want to emphasize the receiver of the verb's
action rather than who or what performs the action.
Apostrophes
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Apostrophes are used with nouns to show possession.
Apostrophes are used in contractions, words that combine two words into one. An
apostrophe is used to show exactly where one or more letters are deleted.
Contractions
Possessive Personal Pronouns
it's
its
you're
your
they're
their
To avoid incorrectly using an apostrophe in some possessive pronouns (its, your,
their), plug in both words that would make up the contraction ("it is" for "it's"; "you
are" for "you're": and "they are" for "they're"). If the sentence makes sense, use the
contraction; if it doesn't sound right, use the possessive pronoun without an
apostrophe.
Add only an apostrophe to form the possessive of a plural noun that ends in the
letter “s.”
Add an apostrophe and the letter "s" ('s) to form the possessive of most singular
nouns. Write the singular noun without adding or omitting any letter. Then add the
apostrophe and "s."
To show joint ownership or possession, add an apostrophe and the letter “s” only to
the last noun.
Appositives
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An appositive is a noun or pronoun (and its modifiers) that appears directly
after another noun or pronoun to describe or rename it.
A nonrestrictive appositive adds extra or nonessential information to a
sentence and commas are used to offset it from the rest of the sentence.
A restrictive appositive contains essential information to the meaning of a
sentence and no commas are used.
Try this simple test to see if you need to use commas to offset an appositive in
the sentence: First, identify the appositive and read the sentence without the
appositive. Then ask, “is the meaning still clear?” If the meaning remains clear,
then it's nonessential and commas are needed.
An appositive can be used to combine ideas and information about nouns from
different sentences within one sentence.
Capitalization
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A proper noun names a particular or specific person, place, or thing; it is capitalized.
A common noun refers to any person, place, or thing; it is not capitalized within a
sentence.
Capitalize titles of people, such as office, rank, or profession, when the title comes
directly before a person's name.
Most titles of people are not capitalized when they stand alone and do not come
directly before a person's name.
Exceptions:
Capitalize titles of high-ranking officials, like the President and VicePresident, when they refer to the current person in office.
Capitalize a person's title when it stands alone in direct address.
Capitalize a title showing a family relationship when it comes directly before a
person's name and when it is used as a person's name.
Do not capitalize a family member's title when it comes directly after a possessive
noun or pronoun.
Capitalize the first, last, and important words in titles and subtitles of written works
and other works of art such as books, articles, songs, movies, and online documents.
Colons
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Use a colon before a list of items if the list is introduced with a complete sentence.
A word that follows a colon is not usually capitalized unless it is a proper noun or
any other word that is usually capitalized.
Use colons to introduce ideas, details, or another sentence.
Capitalize the first word after a colon if it begins a complete sentence.
Simple And Compound Sentences
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A sentence is a group of words that expresses a complete thought and has a subject
and predicate.
A subject (noun or pronoun) names the person, place, thing, or idea that a sentence
is about. It answers the question, “who or what is the sentence about?”
A predicate is a group of words that tells something about the subject or what the
subject does. It answers, “what does it say about the subject or what does the
subject do?”
A simple sentence is made up a group of words that expresses one complete thought
and has a subject and predicate.
A sentence fragment does not express a complete thought and is missing either a
subject and/or predicate.
Connect two simple sentences in a compound sentence with a comma after the first
sentence followed by one of the coordinating conjunctions or FANBOYS: for, and, nor,
but, or, yet, so.
Use one of the FANBOYS that best shows the relationship between the ideas in each
simple sentence.
Dialogue
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Place the exact words a person says in quotation marks.
Begin a new paragraph (indent) when the speaker changes.
Write the sentences of a direct quotation like regular sentences.
Follow these rules when a direct quotation comes at the beginning of a sentence:
Separate it from the dialogue tag with a comma unless it's a question (or
exclamation).
Place the comma, question mark, or exclamation point inside the closing
quotation marks.
Don't capitalize the first word in a dialogue tag unless it is a proper noun
or the pronoun I.
When a direct quotation comes at the end of a sentence, place an end mark, such
as a period, question mark, or exclamation point inside the closing quotation
marks.
When a dialogue tag interrupts a one-sentence quotation, place the speaker's
exact words before and after the tag in quotation marks, use commas to separate
the tag, and do not capitalize the first word in the second part of the quoted
sentence.
If a quotation has more than one sentence, place opening quotation marks before
the first sentence and closing quotation marks after the last sentence that is
spoken.
Keep dialogue tags simple—said is often enough.
Balance dialogue with some action to advance the plot and provide insight into
characters–show rather than tell.
Be selective and include only the important parts of a conversation.
Writing a Series
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A "series" is three or more related words, phrases, or clauses that come one after the
other.
Use commas to separate the items in a series.
It is recommended to use a comma before the conjunction that separates the last
item in a series.
Items in a series help to show rather than tell–by using sensory details.
Make sure items or actions in a series joined by "and" are parallel (e.g., nouns go
with nouns and verbs go with verbs).