From an online article about bedbugs (New York is number one in the USA):
"But it [Terminix] said the appearance on its list of smaller cities shows the insects that live in furniture, clothing and luggage, are getting a grip on the U.S. heartland."
This is a very awkward sentence, especially when it comes to the commas. There's also a problem with the word "that." Let's fumigate this sentence:
"But it said the appearance on its list of smaller cities shows the insects, which live in furniture, clothing and luggage, are getting a grip on the U.S. heartland."
That rewrite gets rid of the the immediate problems, but the sentence still sucks. Let's fumigate it further:
"But the insects, which live in furniture, clothing and luggage, appear to be getting a grip on the U.S. heartland, since they are showing up in smaller U.S. cities."
Ask Me a Question
If you have a writing, grammar, style or punctuation question, send an e-mail message to curiouscase at sign hotmail dot com.
Add Your Own Criminal Sentence!
If you find a particularly terrible sentence somewhere, post it for all to see (go here and put it in the Comments section).
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment