A special 10th anniversary edition of Roy Peter Clark's bestselling guide to writing, featuring five bonus tools. Ten years ago, Roy Peter Clark, America's most influential writing teacher, whittled down almost thirty years of experience in journalism, writing, and teaching into a series of fifty short essays on different aspects of writing. In the past decade, Writing Tools has become a classic guidebook for novices and experts alike and remains one of the best loved books on writing available. Organized into four sections, "Nuts and Bolts," "Special Effects," "Blueprints for Stories," and "Useful Habits," Writing Tools is infused with more than 200 examples from journalism and literature. This new edition includes five brand new, never-before-shared tools. Accessible, entertaining, inspiring, and above all, useful for every type of writer, from high school student to novelist, Writing Tools is essential reading. "Roy Peter Clark knows more about writing than anybody I know who is not currently dead." ― Dave Barry, author of Dave Barry's History of the Millennium (So Far) "Clark is a joyful, brilliant teacher who unlocks the mysteries of literary flow. This book is one to keep near the keyboard." ― Anne Hull, national reporter for the Washington Post "Roy is the Obi-Wan Kenobi of writing teachers....Like its author, Writing Tools is brilliant, openhearted, and indispensable; it's easily one of the best books ever published about our craft."― Thomas French, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author of Zoo Story "Clark is a national treasure that needs to be mined aggressively." ― DeWayne Wickham, USA Today "For all the aspiring writers out there--whether you're writing a novel or a technical report--a respected scholar at Florida's Poynter Institute for Journalists pulls back the curtain on the art."― Teresa K. Weaver , Atlanta Journal-Constitution "Pull out a favorite novel or short story, and read it with the guidance of...Clark's ideas....Readers will find new worlds in familiar places. And writers will be inspired to pick up their pens."― Boston Globe "No matter what you write--a blog, a love letter, the next great American novel-- Writing Tools offers practical advice that is a pleasure to read."― St. Petersburg Times Roy Peter Clark is senior scholar at the Poynter Institute, one of the most prestigious schools for journalists in the world. He has taught writing at every level -- from schoolchildren to Pulitzer Prize-winning authors -- for more than forty years. A writer who teaches and a teacher who writes, he has authored or edited nineteen books on writing and journalism, including The Art of X-Ray Reading , How to Write Short , Writing Tools , The Glamour of Grammar , and Help! for Writers . He lives in St. Petersburg, Florida, where he is considered a garage-band legend. Writing Tools By Roy Peter Clark Little, Brown and Company Copyright © 2006 Roy Peter Clark All right reserved. ISBN: 978-0-316-01499-1 Chapter One TOOL 1 Begin sentences with subjects and verbs. Make meaning early, then let weaker elements branch to the right. Imagine each sentence you write printed on the world's widest piece of paper. In English, a sentence stretches from left to right. Now imagine this. A writer composes a sentence with subject and verb at the beginning, followed by other subordinate elements, creating what scholars call a right-branching sentence . I just created one. Subject and verb of the main clause join on the left ("a writer composes") while all other elements branch to the right. Here's another right-branching sentence, written by Lydia Polgreen as the lead of a news story in the New York Times: Rebels seized control of Cap Haitien, Haiti's second largest city, on Sunday, meeting little resistance as hundreds of residents cheered, burned the police station, plundered food from port warehouses and looted the airport, which was quickly closed. Police officers and armed supporters of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide fled. That first sentence contains thirty-seven words and ripples with action. The sentence is so full, in fact, that it threatens to fly apart like an overheated engine. But the writer guides the reader by capturing meaning in the first three words: "Rebels seized control." Think of that main clause as the locomotive that pulls all the cars that follow. Master writers can craft page after page of sentences written in this structure. Consider this passage by John Steinbeck from Cannery Row , describing the routine of a marine scientist named Doc (the emphasis is mine): He didn't need a clock. He had been working in a tidal pattern so long that he could feel a tide change in his sleep. In the dawn he awakened , looked out through the windshield and saw that the water was already retreating down the bouldery flat. He drank some hot coffee, ate three sandwiches, and had a quart of beer. The tide goes out