El. knyga: Quite Literally: Problem Words and How to use Them

What's an alibi, a bete noire, a celibate, a dilemma? Should underway be two words? Is the word meretricious worth using at all? How do you spell realise? With an s or a z? And should bete be bete? Should you split infinitives, end sentences with prepositions, start them with conjunctions? What about four-letter words, euphemisms, foreign words, Americanisms, cliches, slang, jargon? And does the Queen speak the Queen's English?
Quite Literally answers questions like these, and more. It's a guide to English usage for readers and writers, professional and amateur, established and aspiring, and for anyone who's ever been agitated about apostrophes or distressed by dangling modifiers. It concentrates on writing rather than speech. But the advice given on how to use words in writing can usually be applied to formal speech - what is carefully considered, broadcast, presented, scripted or prepared for delivery to a public audience - as opposed to informal, colloquial speech.

In his dictionary of English usage, an English journalist/editor clarifies many ambiguities of the Queen's English. Entries, some with quotes from language mavens, cover such problematic areas as homophones that confound computer spell-checkers, slang, and Americanisms. But some of his interpretations are open to debate. E.g., given the recent opening of the National Museum of the American Indian, his selection of Native American as the "approved word" is questionable. The volume includes further reading but not an index. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)