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I don’t go anywhere without my moleskin notebook, although I have recently bought a few of paperblanks ones as I’m drawn to their great designs and magnetised closures. With their acid-free pages (doing the job of preserving) your writing won’t disappear gradually over the years. My very first A4 lined notebook that I began when I was four years old was not of the … Continue reading
Wiktionary shows this Latin term in two parts: status meaning ‘state’ and quo meaning ‘in which’. According to Wikipedia, the definition of status quo is ‘current or existing state of affairs’. The status quo is how things are right now, rather than how things could be. Example sentences Fire swept through the town destroying many buildings. … Continue reading
According to Wikipedia, per se is a Latin phrase meaning ‘in itself’, although the individual Latin words can be defined as: per = by or through se = itself, himself, herself or themselves The Merriam Webster dictionary explains that per se can be used as an adverb or an adjective as follows: Definition of per se as an adverb (source: … Continue reading
Merriam Webster defines the noun frisson as a “brief moment of emotional excitement”. The Collins English Dictionary has a similar meaning of “shiver of fear or excitement” . The appropriate synonyms are shudder and thrill which is also the translation of frisson in French (according to About.com). Did you know that the first known use of this word … Continue reading
Your writing style is unique to you – if people choose to read what you write, it will be because they like your style and the personality that shines through. William Zinsser, author of On Writing Well, says that “all writing is a journey; you the writer are asking someone to go on a trip with you”. This could apply … Continue reading
On my way home from work I flicked through The Little Red Writing Book by Brandon Royal in order to get some inspiration for today’s blog. In the introduction he explains that “writing had four pillars – structure, style, readability and grammar” and compares each pillar to a single chair leg. My interpretation of this is the … Continue reading
According to Graham King in his book Collins Improve your Writing Skills, a simile “makes a direct comparison between two dissimilar things”, for example, as fit as a fiddle or as drunk as a skunk and similes are usually joined by the introductory words ‘as’, ‘like’, ‘as if’ or ‘as though’. Bernard C Lamb in his book The Queen’s English calls them … Continue reading
Have you ever wondered how successful your Twitter account is? Today I learnt about a great free tool called Tweet Grader (by HubSpot) and by just typing in your Twitter user name, you can find out how powerful your account is against millions of other graded accounts. It only takes a minute or so for your … Continue reading
I’ve heard a lot about Digg and its benefits to writers but never visited the site until today. Digg is a social media site displaying blogs and articles about a wide variety of topics e.g. lifestyle, sport, technology and many more. Digg itself doesn’t decide what is popular, this is all done by users votes (or Diggs). The … Continue reading
To mark the milestone of my 200th blog on my daily My Writing Challenge I thought I’d show you something a little different. Did you know that The Free Dictionary (by Farlex) is more than just a dictionary, thesaurus and encyclopedia? The link above will take you to their home page which has a whole range of information and … Continue reading
My Writing Notebook 