Have you ever wondered how to create clear simple sentences, detailed multi-clause sentences, or ornate left-, mid-, and right-branching sentences? As any wordsmith knows, sentences form the foundation for writing success. This two-part book, containing hundreds of illustrative quotations and fun exercises, reveals how to draft and craft any sentence, whether plain and lucid or thrilling and forceful. On the first part of the journey, writing pilgrims are introduced to the fundamentals: Twelve Templates to Turn a Timeless Sentence. The second part then builds on this bedrock, showing How to Fashion Exquisitely Styled Sentences. After finishing this journey, students, professionals, and writers of every skill and status will have enhanced their sentential potential, while mastering the art of stringing words together to produce sophisticated sentences – linguistic structures standing the tests of time and taste.

A guide to managing data in the digital age. Winner of the ALCTS Outstanding Publication Award by the Association for Library Collections & Technical Services, Winner of the Waldo Gifford Leland Award by the Society of American Archivists Many people believe that what is on the Internet will be around forever. At the same time, warnings of an impending "digital dark age"—where records of the recent past become completely lost or inaccessible—appear with regular frequency in the popular press. It's as if we need a system to safeguard our digital records for future scholars and researchers. Digital preservation experts, however, suggest that this is an illusory dream not worth chasing. Ensuring long-term access to digital information is not that straightforward; it is a complex issue with a significant ethical dimension. It is a vocation. In The Theory and Craft of Digital Preservation, librarian Trevor Owens establishes a baseline for practice in this field. In the first section of the book, Owens synthesizes work on the history of preservation in a range of areas (archives, manuscripts, recorded sound, etc.) and sets that history in dialogue with work in new media studies, platform studies, and media archeology. In later chapters, Owens builds from this theoretical framework and maps out a more deliberate and intentional approach to digital preservation. A basic introduction to the issues and practices of digital preservation, the book is anchored in an understanding of the traditions of preservation and the nature of digital objects and media. Based on extensive reading, research, and writing on digital preservation, Owens's work will prove an invaluable reference for archivists, librarians, and museum professionals, as well as scholars and researchers in the digital humanities.

The definitive handbook for the novelist who is ready to revise This wise and friendly guide shows writers how to turn first-draft manuscripts into the novels of their dreams. A critic, longtime teacher, and award-winning novelist, Sandra Scofield illustrates how to reread a work of fiction with a view of its subject and vision, and how to take it apart and put it back together again, stronger and deeper. Scofield builds her explanations around helpful concepts like narrative structure, character agency, and core scenes, using models from classic and contemporary writers. The detailed, step-by-step plan laid out in The Last Draft offers invaluable advice to both novice and experienced writers alike. In Scofield, they will find a seasoned, encouraging mentor to steer them through this emotional and intellectual journey.

How do you write a book? Stuart Horwitz helps you do it in three drafts. Three drafts: that's all you need. - The messy draft: which is all about getting it down. - The method draft: which is all about making sense. - The polished draft: which is all about making it good. Finish Your Book in Three Drafts is for outliners who meticulously script every writing session and pantsers who pilot solely by feel. It will help you get past the fear that can land a first draft in the trashcan, and the confusion that can send a second draft into a dizzying tailspin. Because you don't want to be writing the same book for the rest of your life. You can Finish Your Book in Three Drafts provided you approach each draft in the right spirit, and know what action steps to take between drafts. With clarity, honesty, humor, and even videos, Horwitz discusses the best outlook and direction for each of the three drafts so that you can increase your efficiency, satisfaction, and engagement with both your writing process and your final product.

Until the recent unauthorized release of thousands of classified State Department cables, public attention was rarely drawn to the frequently outstanding political analysis done by American diplomats abroad. The existing literature on diplomacy has heretofore been limited to memoirs of former diplomats and analyses of international affairs by diplomats, academics, and think tanks. The Craft of Political Analysis offers a fresh approach, one that provides a context for interpreting this embassy reporting and a guide to understanding the work that went on behind the scenes to produce it. Author Raymond F. Smith combines a practitioner’s personal view of what is required to do good diplomatic political analysis with his understanding of the social conflict and change that informed his work for the State Department. Smith clearly explains everything the Foreign Service candidate or professional, as well as the interested layman, needs to know about crafting political analysis, including how to write for the analyst’s intended audience, how to make best use of the intellectual and analytical tools of the trade, what happens when the analyst’s views differ from government policy, and why political analysis risks becoming irrelevant, even though it is still urgently needed. In addition, The Craft of Political Analysis for Diplomats features two case studies using legally declassified cables not included in the Wikileaks release. The first is built around four highly restricted Embassy Moscow cables on the collapse of the Soviet Union; the second includes two cables on the Arab-Israeli conflict that received the State Department’s highest award for political analysis. Selected for the Diplomats and Diplomacy Series of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training (ADST) and DACOR, an organization of foreign affairs professionals.

Unlike books that focus solely on methods, The Craft of Collaborative Planning provides a detailed guide to designing and managing all aspects of the collaborative process, advocating for making collaborative work the norm. Beginning with a discussion of the political and legal context of collaborative practice in UK land use planning systems, The Craft of Collaborative Planning tracks a path through the challenging task of process design and working with various groups and individuals. Taking into account the great need for coherent organizational approaches, Bishop outlines evaluation and learning from the collaborative process for the future. Jeff Bishop brings to his writing an exemplary career focused on bringing various parties together to generate creative and widely supported plans and projects. With its focused discussion of UK engagement practices, and detailed outline for making a better collaborative process, The Craft of Collaborative Planning is an essential read for practitioners and decision-makers seeking to bring communities together with creative solutions to spatial planning, design, and development.

Writing nonfiction represents a big step for most students. Most young writers are not intimidated by personal narrative, fiction, or even poetry, but when they try to put together a "teaching book," report, or persuasive essay, they often feel anxious and frustrated. JoAnn Portalupi and Ralph Fletcher believe that young nonfiction writers supply plenty of passion, keen interest, and wonder. Teachers can provide concrete strategies to help students scaffold their ideas as they write in his challenging genre. Like the authors' best-selling Craft Lessons: Teaching Writing K-8, this book is divided into sections for K-2, 3-4, and middle school (grades 5-8) students. These divisions reflect various differences between emerging, competent, and fluent writers. In each section you'll find a generous collection of craft lessons directed at the genre that's most appropriate for that particular age. In the K-2 section, for example, a number of craft lessons focus on the all-about or concept book. In the 3-4 section there are several lessons on biography. In the 5-8 section a series of lessons addresses expository writing. Throughout the book each of the 80 lessons is presented on a single page in an easy-to-read format. Every lesson features three teaching guidelines: Discussion--A brief look at the reasons for teaching the particular element of craft specifically in a nonfiction context.How to Teach It--Concrete language showing exactly how a teacher might bring this craft element to students in writing conferences or a small-group setting.Resource Material--Specific book or text referred to in the craft lesson including trade books, or a piece of student writing in the Appendixes. This book will help students breathe voice into lifeless "dump-truck" writing and improve their nonfiction writing by making it clearer, more authoritative, and more organized. Nonfiction Craft Lessons gives teachers a wealth of practical strategies to help students grow into strong writers as they explore and explain the world around them. Be sure to look at the When Students Write videotapes too.