Williams, Joseph. Style : Toward Clarity and Grace. 6th ed. New York: Longman, 1999. This is the big one in the canon of books about how to improve language and style in writing. That is, it's the one that actually has the best chance of doing the most good. There is at least a good argument that language and style is what we ought to work on the most in composition classes, and if that is so this book makes a lot of sense as a textbook. Nevertheless, what I like best about it is what it has done for me to improve my own writing.

What this book does is show how sentences and paragraphs move in the minds of readers, and how you use that to construct better ones. It introduces writers to a set of highly descriptive terms that help them understand what to do without burying them in abstract grammar terms. It also addresses a number of the bad habits of better writers, explaining things like when to use jargon and when to back it off, and why this is ultimately even an issue of ethics. I found this book the perfect antidote to years of legal writing.

I've now worked with four different editions, read three cover to cover, and reviewed one for the publisher. I do believe this sixth edition is the best yet. The earlier versions had been poorer textbooks, but there was always a strong, clear expression of the key ideas, and I'd thought some of the "teaching apparatus" had junked that up. But now in this sixth edition, I think the book has really finally hit its stride as a book that could be used more widely in more classrooms. Contributed by Keith Rhodes 2000 Invitational Participant.