Here are 59 books that Roget's Thesaurus of Words for Writers fans have personally recommended if you like
Roget's Thesaurus of Words for Writers.
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I am passionate about this book list because it helped me get where I am today, a multiple-times bestselling author and an award-winning senior reporter. I began working as an overnight police round reporter before moving into sports, where I became one of Australia's best news-breaking rugby league journalists. I was then appointed News Corp Australia's Chief National Motorsports Writer and traveled the world chasing Formula 1 story, as well as covering Australia's V8 Supercar races. Everyone has to start somewhere, and for me, this list of books helped me begin and continue to grow to reach the level of success that I have.
This one didn’t change my life, but it did provide me with a no-nonsense guide to pesky things like conjunctions and clauses, superlatives and synonyms, prepositions and pronouns, and, obviously, alliteration. Ha.
What I liked most about this book is that it isn’t written like a textbook. I read what is widely considered to be the writer's bible, The Elements of Style by William Struck and E.B. White, and considered giving up on my dream of becoming a writer because the book made me feel as if only someone with an Einstein-like intellect could write.
But, as Mr. King wrote, the story is what matters; everything else is just dressing. But in saying that, being able to string together sentences helps (I think my jokes are funny, but no one else does), and this book gives a simple explanation of how to make your copy sing.
On Writing Well has been praised for its sound advice, its clarity and the warmth of its style. It is a book for everybody who wants to learn how to write or who needs to do some writing to get through the day, as almost everybody does in the age of e-mail and the Internet.
Whether you want to write about people or places, science and technology, business, sports, the arts or about yourself in the increasingly popular memoir genre, On Writing Well offers you fundamental priciples as well as the insights of a distinguished writer and teacher. With more…
The dragons of Yuro have been hunted to extinction.
On a small, isolated island, in a reclusive forest, lives bandit leader Marani and her brother Jacks. With their outlaw band they rob from the rich to feed themselves, raiding carriages and dodging the occasional vindictive…
I’m an oral historian as well as a writer, so I’ve always been fascinated by how people speak and how they interact with each other through dialogue. I soon realized some of the ways spoken language differs from written language and began exploring those differences. When I started writing, the dialogue came fairly easily, but this was deceptive, as I wasn’t being rigorous enough–I wasn’t making the dialogue really work for the script. So, I’m always trying to get better at that. I’ve had over 60 scripts performed on stage, radio, and screen, but I still gobble up books about speech and dialogue–there is always more to be learned.
I loved the voice of this book–it’s the voice of Stephen King, clever, yes, and a brilliant novelist, of course, but also absolutely down-to-earth. King is a perfectionist, continually going back through his writing to hone it–a useful reminder to all of us not to be satisfied with a first or second draft.
The book shows how, in the best writing, both dialogue and plot arise out of character. And I particularly valued his emphasis on cutting, cutting, cutting–dialogue and everything else. He’s made me do that more than ever!
Twentieth Anniversary Edition with Contributions from Joe Hill and Owen King
ONE OF TIME MAGAZINE’S TOP 100 NONFICTION BOOKS OF ALL TIME
Immensely helpful and illuminating to any aspiring writer, this special edition of Stephen King’s critically lauded, million-copy bestseller shares the experiences, habits, and convictions that have shaped him and his work.
“Long live the King” hailed Entertainment Weekly upon publication of Stephen King’s On Writing. Part memoir, part master class by one of the bestselling authors of all time, this superb volume is a revealing and practical view of the writer’s craft, comprising the basic tools of the…
When your storytelling simulates imagined physiological experiences, it guides your listeners to vicariously see, hear, smell, taste, and touch the world of your story. While my books suggest six kinds of stories and four buckets to find stories, I also use these favorite resources for training my brain to think in sensory language. Dip in to find a steady supply of metaphors, images, mannerisms, and context builders that make your story come alive. Current strategies that maximize clicks rarely tap into the wealth of sensory language needed to build epic, long-lasting results.
Yes, it says for writers, but this book is a great resource for in-person storytelling. On these pages are thousands of ideas on how you can show, not tell.
Comb through ideas on how to express a character’s emotion with posture, tone, and mannerisms. Don’t just say, “he looked guilty.” Look up “guilt” and find ways to indicate guilt without telling people what to think. Have your guilty character “avert her eyes,” “shift her feet,” “pull at her collar,” or “suddenly lose her appetite.” I regularly flick through this book to train my imagination on the sensory cues that make a story come alive.
The bestselling Emotion Thesaurus, often hailed as “the gold standard for writers” and credited with transforming how writers craft emotion, has now been expanded to include 55 new entries!
One of the biggest struggles for writers is how to convey emotion to readers in a unique and compelling way. When showing our characters’ feelings, we often use the first idea that comes to mind, and they end up smiling, nodding, and frowning too much.
If you need inspiration for creating characters’ emotional responses that are personalized and evocative, this ultimate show-don’t-tell guide for emotion can help. It includes:
When Annie Thornton, midwife and apprentice witch, falls through time to a 15th-century Yorkshire village with her telepathic cat, Rosamund, she befriends Will and Jack, two soldiers returning from the French Wars. Mistress Meg, Annie’s ancestral aunt living in the 15th century, is…
I am passionate about this book list because it helped me get where I am today, a multiple-times bestselling author and an award-winning senior reporter. I began working as an overnight police round reporter before moving into sports, where I became one of Australia's best news-breaking rugby league journalists. I was then appointed News Corp Australia's Chief National Motorsports Writer and traveled the world chasing Formula 1 story, as well as covering Australia's V8 Supercar races. Everyone has to start somewhere, and for me, this list of books helped me begin and continue to grow to reach the level of success that I have.
So, if builders go to Bunnings to find their tools and I go to Rogets for mine, well then, Merriam-Webster is just another brand of hardware store for writers. But let’s call this one Mitre Ten.
This is a staple of a home office when writing. Have it sitting there in plain sight all day long while you write.
The perfect book for expanding your working vocabulary and an indispensable tool for students preparing for standardized tests.
250 Greek and Latin roots aid in the learning of 1,000 words along with over 2,000 closely related terms
Features helpful usage examples and quizzes to test your memory
Organized by Greek and Latin roots– the building blocks of English vocabulary
Perfect for students prepping for standardized tests including SAT, ACT, TOEFL, and TOEIC
*BOOK COVER DESIGNS MAY VARY: We recently redesigned the Merriam-Webster’s Vocabulary Builder book cover so some customers may receive the original design and others may receive the new…
I’ve been working with words for over 25 years, as a writer and editor in publishing houses, design studios, and now as a freelance. I help everyone from big brands and small businesses through to academics and consultants get their ideas out of their heads and on to the page. I was an original co-founder of ProCopywriters, the UK alliance for commercial writers. I’ve written and self-published four books, the most recent of which is How to Write Clearly. The books I’ve chosen all helped me to write as clearly as I can—not least when writing about writing itself. I hope they help you too!
I first read this as a teenager, and its wise counsel has stayed with me ever since. Gowers’ book was originally written as a guide for British government workers, to help them avoid the perils of jargon and ‘officialese’ and write in a way that colleagues and (more importantly) the person in the street could actually understand.
The fact that I could immediately apply the ideas to my school essays shows you why this book has been continuously in print since the 1950s, and why generations of writers have found it so useful in shaping their own style.
Practicing exactly what he preaches, Gowers lays down the principles of plain English, in plain English. Read and see why this deserves to be called a classic.
When Sir Ernest Gowers first wrote Plain Words, it was intended simply as a guide to the proper use of English for the Civil Service. Within a year, however, its humour, charm and authority had made it a bestseller. Since then it has never been out of print.
Six decades on, writer Rebecca Gowers has created a new edition of this now-classic work that both revises and celebrates her great-grandfather's original. Plain Words has been updated to reflect numerous changes in English usage, yet Sir Ernest's distinctive, witty voice is undimmed. And his message…
How could a historian of the USnotfind Lincoln an endlessly fascinating figure? As a young(ish) university teacher, I jumped at the invitation to write a study of the 16th president, but didn’t expect it to win the coveted Lincoln Prize. When it did, in 2004, the community of American Lincoln scholars made me, a Welsh professor from Oxford University, doubly welcome. In several books I’ve examined Lincoln’s political skill, strategic ambition, and moral purposes. But he was more than a gifted pragmatist. His greater goal was to leave his nation stronger and a little closer to realizing the principles of equality laid out in the Declaration of Independence of 1776.
Lincoln was a great communicator, whose greatest speeches deliver emotional power through unfussy language. Harriet Beecher Stowe, the author of the best-selling page-turner Uncle Tom’s Cabin, knew a thing or two about language. She said Lincoln’s compelling words had “the relish and smack of the soil.” Douglas Wilson’s study is an exercise in historical detection. Sleuth-like he uses the successive manuscript drafts of Lincoln’s speeches and public letters to show his care in choosing his words, and how alert he was to sense, sound, imagery, context, and clarity. Lincoln’s Sword is a masterpiece, a showcase of the literary and political sensibilities that made Wilson an acclaimed winner of the Lincoln Prize.
Widely considered in his own time as a genial but provincial lightweight who was out of place in the presidency, Abraham Lincoln astonished his allies and confounded his adversaries by producing a series of speeches and public letters so provocative that they helped revolutionize public opinion on such critical issues as civil liberties, the use of black soldiers, and the emancipation of slaves. This is a brilliant and unprecedented examination of how Lincoln used the power of words to not only build his political career but to keep the country united during the Civil War.
Chasing Light is a lyrical meditation on grief, memory, and the fragile beauty of everyday life. At its core, it is a story of resilience, forgiveness, and the transformational power of human connection. It sheds light on the overlooked realities of homelessness and addiction, while emphasizing the importance of compassion…
From Lehr’s prize-winning fiction to her viral New York Times Modern Love essay, exploring the challenges facing contemporary women has been Lehr’s life-long passion. A Boob’s Life, her first project since breast cancer treatment, continues this mission, taking all who will join her on a wildly informative, deeply personal, and utterly relatable journey. And that’s exactly the kind of books she likes to read – the ones that make her laugh, nod in recognition, and understand a little more about life. She recommends these five books to everyone who asks.
Ok sure, she had me at the title. But Montell dives deep into the language we use every day that, yes, often demeans women. Many of our body parts were taken from Latin words that dudes used to describe them. And the meanings weren’t always flattering. She also explains the positives of Valley Girl-Speak such as “like” and of vocal fry, and women are so fast to say “sorry.” Did you know that “hussy” used to mean housewife and “slut” meant a messy person that could be a man? Or that “bitch” used to be a gender-neutral name that had nothing to do with dogs? And why are some words considered feminine and others, male? Read this book to find out.
"I get so jazzed about the future of feminism knowing that Amanda Montell's brilliance is rising up and about to explode worldwide."-Jill Soloway
A brash, enlightening, and wildly entertaining feminist look at gendered language and the way it shapes us.
The word bitch conjures many images, but it is most often meant to describe an unpleasant woman. Even before its usage to mean "a female canine," bitch didn't refer to women at all-it originated as a gender-neutral word for "genitalia." A perfectly innocuous word devolving into an insult directed at females is the case for tons more terms, including hussy,…
When I began teaching in higher education and mentoring teacher candidates whose ambitions were to teach in culturally diverse urban schools, I was shocked to find out that my course was one of the first in which many students were asked to explicitly address issues of educational equity and systemic racism. Cultural diversity in teacher education programs is often a one-shot, watered-down class about “celebrating diversity.” This approach doesn't support candidates in becoming teachers who can challenge how low-income students of color are stereotyped and labeled “at-risk,” with curricula sadly focusing more on compliance and discipline than learning, inquiry, and agency.
This expansive collection of essays published in 2011 provides a historical accounting of the challenges involved in preparing teachers to work with diverse student populations, as well as a review of the research on multicultural education, culturally relevant pedagogy, and critical race theory.
With twenty chapters written by some of the most influential people in contemporary teacher education–such as Gloria Ladson-Billings, Carl Grant, Sonia Nieto, and Etta Hollis, to name but a few—this book is a classic that stands the test of time.
Studying Diversity in Teacher Education is a collaborative effort by experts seeking to elucidate one of the most important issues facing education today. First, the volume examines historically persistent, yet unresolved issues in teacher education and presents research that is currently being done to address these issues. Second, it centers on research on diverse populations, bringing together both research on diversity and research on diversity in teacher education. The contributors present frameworks, perspectives and paradigms that have implications for reframing research on complex issues that are often ignored or treated too simplistically in teacher education literature. Concluding the volume with…
I am a Greek social psychologist and have spent much of my academic career studying myths and stories in social life - stories, even when inaccurate or wrong, serve to create meaning, a fragile and valuable resource, especially in these post-truth times. At the same time, I believe that we must not lose sight of the distinctions between story and fact, fantasy and reality, truth and fiction. I am greatly concerned that the social sciences today, as shaped by the academic publishing game, are preoccupied with trivia and act as black holes into which meaning disappears. I strongly believe that it is our responsibility to restore the meaningfulness of academic research.
This is a must for any aspiring social scientist. Ironically entitled, the book offers a brilliant account of how many researchers in the social sciences resort to esoteric jargon and abstruse arguments to promote themselves in their academic micro-fiefdoms, defend their areas of expertise from outsiders but also to obfuscate and conceal their own ignorance. The book, however, can also be read on how to write well andget published in the social sciences.
Modern academia is increasingly competitive yet the writing style of social scientists is routinely poor and continues to deteriorate. Are social science postgraduates being taught to write poorly? What conditions adversely affect the way they write? And which linguistic features contribute towards this bad writing? Michael Billig's witty and entertaining book analyses these questions in a quest to pinpoint exactly what is going wrong with the way social scientists write. Using examples from diverse fields such as linguistics, sociology and experimental social psychology, Billig shows how technical terminology is regularly less precise than simpler language. He demonstrates that there are…
Portrait of an Artist as a Young Woman
by
Alexis Krasilovsky,
Kate from Jules et Jim meets I Love Dick.
A young woman filmmaker’s journey of self-discovery, set against a backdrop of the sexual liberation movement of the 1970s and 1980s. In Portrait of an Artist as a Young Woman, we follow Ana Fried as she faces the ultimate…
I've dedicated my professional life to the creation of a nation of writers. I began my career as a young professor of English, teaching literature and composition at a small campus in Alabama. As a New Yorker, I began writing about my experiences in the South. I began hanging out with journalists and became fascinated by their sense of craft, and their sense of mission and purpose. This led to an invitation as a writing coach at the St. Petersburg Times, one of the best newspapers in the country, now called the Tampa Bay Times. That year led to 40 years as a writing coach and a senior scholar at the Poynter Institute.
If I had to choose just one book on language that all American college students should read, it would be this one.
The author wrote early versions of this book in 1939 and 1941, when World War II was breaking out, and the world came to understand the poisonous nature of Nazi propaganda. The study of semantics turns out to be more than an abstract consideration of language. The responsible use of language is the antidote to disinformation, a lesson we can carry into our own times.
Why neutral reports are crucial to democracy and self-government; how connotations of words reveal bias; the power of climbing up and down the ladder of abstraction so readers can see and understand; all these are introduced to the reader in this groundbreaking work.
In an era when communication has become increasingly diverse and complex, this classic work on semantics—now fully revised and updated—distills the relationship between language and those who use it.
Renowned professor and former U.S. Senator S. I. Hayakawa discusses the role of language in human life, the many functions of language, and how language—sometimes without our knowing—shapes our thinking in this engaging and highly respected book. Provocative and erudite, it examines the relationship between language and racial and religious prejudice; the nature and dangers of advertising from a linguistic point of view; and, in an additional chapter called “The Empty…
