Chicago Tribune mention--Anyone see the missing quotation mark?

The link doesn't work so well (http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/life/ct-tribu-words-work-that-20130220,0,4792270.story), so here is the text:

By Heidi Stevens, Tribune Newspapers

February 20, 2013

We were going to spend today discussing sequestration, a word springing from the lips of politicians left and right and begging to be more clearly defined.

Then we read Time columnist Joel Stein's explanation, upon which it's impossible to improve: "The situation in which the federal budget will be different if something doesn't something before something."

Exactly.

Which leaves us room to discuss a word springing from the lips of actual people, much to the dismay of other actual people.

The word is "that." For all its banality, "that," has an impressive ability to irk folks.

"My pet peeve is 'that,'" writes Words Work reader Gene Keefe. "'The judge felt that it took too long.' 'The hearing officer ruled that it was too far away.' 'I heard that you are too tall to shoot pool.'"

"Where you have a verb and 'that' after it," Keefe contends, "it makes the sentence longer without any change."

It's a complaint we hear with some regularity, often from readers lamenting an undisciplined wordiness creeping into much of our discourse.

But 'that' has its share of vocal defenders.

Jay Heinrichs, author of "Word Hero: A Fiendishly Clever Guide to Crafting the Lines that Get Laughs, Go Viral, and Live Forever" (Three Rivers Press) and one of our favorite language dudes, calls himself "a that guy."

"'That' does make a sentence longer by an entire, often annoying, syllable," Heinrichs says. "But it serves to pin down the object of a sentence.

"Our unraveling grammar needs all the pins it can get."

Bonnie Trenga, author of "The Curious Case of the Misplaced Modifier: How to Solve the Mysteries of Weak Writing" (Writer's Digest Books), wrote a grammar.quickanddirtytips.com blog post titled "When to leave out 'that.'"

Her conclusion? Sometimes.

"Some people think adding 'that' improves the flow of the sentence and makes it easier for the reader to understand," Trenga writes. "Others believe they should delete every seemingly unnecessary 'that' because they want to maintain an economy of words.

"I'm all for cutting unnecessary words," she writes. But I often like to keep my 'that' if it helps the rhythm of the sentence. You'll have to judge whether using 'that' in your particular sentence improves or hurts its flow."

Trenga agitates for 'that' inclusion in the case of "garden path sentences," linguist Steven Pinker's term for sentences that appear to be going in one direction but wind up in another.

"Aardvark maintains Squiggly's yard is too big," Trenga offers as an example.

"Without a 'that,' the reader is initially led to believe that Aardvark maintains, as in mows, Squiggly's yard," she writes. "If you add in a 'that,' it's clear from the beginning that Aardvark just has an opinion: Aardvark maintains that Squiggly's yard is too big."

You could turn to the grammar big guns on this one, but they hardly put the issue to rest.

The Elements of Style, William Strunk Jr. and E. B. White's style guide by which many writers swear, lists as its seventeenth principle of composition: Omit needless words.

In each of Mr. Keefe's sentences, "that" does appear to be pretty needless.

The Associated Press Style Book, on the other hand, argues for keeping the word in your toolbox:

"There are no hard-and-fast rules, but in general:

•That usually may be omitted when a dependent clause immediately follows a form of the verb to say: The president said he had signed the bill.

•That should be used when a time element intervenes between the verb and the dependent clause: The president said Monday that he had signed the bill.

•That usually is necessary after some verbs. They include: advocate, assert, contend, declare, estimate, make clear, point out, propose and state.

•That is required before subordinate clauses beginning with conjunctions such as after, although, because, before, in addition to, until and while: Haldeman said that after he learned of Nixon's intention to resign, he sought pardons for all connected with Watergate.

"When in doubt, include that," AP says. "Omission can hurt. Inclusion never does."

hstevens@tribune.com

Twitter @heidistevens13

Copyright © 2013 Chicago Tribune Company, LLC

Nice Recommendation of "The Curious Case of the Misplaced Modifier"

Check out this article that recommends my book! It's reviewed in the last paragraph under "Grammar and Writing."

Janet Reid's Most Recent Contest

I summoned my inner pervert and got on the finalists' list of her contest. Woo hoo!

The Writer Print Article: "5 Roadblocks to Good Writing"

Check out the August 2010 issue of The Writer, where you can read my article, "5 Roadblocks to Good Writing."

One reader is making her shopping list instead of pondering your plot. Another just slipped your book onto his shelf, thinking, “I’ll try again later, if I can make myself slog through this mess.” If your piece crashed and burned, maybe it’s because one or more traffic cones stood in the way of a good read. Learn how to navigate around them and keep your readers on board.

Traffic cone 1: too jumbled. When writing nonfiction, you must present clear and logical arguments. Readers don’t want to zigzag all over, so use your rough draft to map out the easy-to-follow route you’ll take. It’s natural for first drafts to meander and to repeat or omit information (you should have seen my first draft of this section!). When you arrive at draft two, you’ll know better how to present your material. Fiction gets mixed up, too. Perhaps you’ve described a character or setting twice, two snippets of dialogue are repetitive, or multiple characters serve the same purpose.

Whichever you’re writing, keep like ideas together. Follow an outline if you have to. If you’ve repeated yourself, move sentences about the same topic together and pick which version sounds best. Add missing supporting arguments if you haven’t fleshed out a point. Notice the last sentences of each paragraph in your draft. They may turn out to be good topic sentences (perhaps it took you a paragraph to figure out your point). Comb through your piece to find areas that lack logical organization.

Traffic cone 2: too dull. It’s dangerous to drive with cruise control because it lulls you into a monotonous rhythm. It’s the same situation with sentences that have similar structures. It’s boring for readers. It’s clear by now (if you’ve looked closely at this paragraph) that you shouldn’t start each sentence in the same way.

One time, use a compound sentence with two parts separated by “and.” Begin the next sentence with a long modifier. Sprinkle in the occasional long sentence (not too long, you hear?) and a few short, staccato sentences. Be daring and throw in a fragment to ensure your readers remain interested and awake.

Traffic cone 3: too general. You don’t want to follow the same route as everyone else. Most weak pieces don’t differentiate themselves; anyone could have written them. Think back to grade school, when you had to write a paper about your favorite film. Your teacher probably read multiple essays that began “My favorite movie is X.” Bor-ing! Stand out by avoiding platitudes, clichés, generalities and vagueness. Aim instead for imaginative vocabulary, and fill your work with examples, not generic phrases. Use specific verbs (cut down on “to be”) and precise nouns instead of relying on adjectives and adverbs. Give your work personality by adding your unique voice. (Nobody would mistake a Proust sentence for someone else’s.) Be concrete, and use more imagination.

Traffic cone 4: too inappropriate. You shouldn’t drive with the top down during a rainstorm. Neither should nonfiction writers obfuscate their upshot with an ostentatious lexicon. (That means don’t try to impress your readers by using fancy words or plowing through the thesaurus!) Deliver a nonboring piece tailored to your readers.

Novelists, too, need to pay attention—to their characters’ vocabulary and grammatical patterns. Most modern characters would not say “whom,” but a 19th-century one might. Read your dialogue aloud and ask yourself, “Would a real person with my protagonist’s characteristics say that?” Hey, it might be OK for a character to use improper grammar.

Traffic cone 5: too awkward. No reader wants to be distracted by distorted grammar, punctuation and spelling. Although some stuffy rules have been relaxed (yes, you may end a sentence with a preposition and start one with “because”), don’t veer off the conventional road too much. And don’t rely on your spell-checker to catch all potential errors.

You might have written the most poignant vignette or the most thoroughly researched piece ever, but if faced with syntactical gaffes and incomprehensible sentence structure, readers won’t get past your first page—or paragraph. These days, podcasts, websites and blogs, in addition to traditional books and magazine articles, make it fun to brush up on the rules.

Grammar Girl endorses Curious Case, now out in paperback!

Grammar Girl, a fellow grammarian and my friend, has endorsed my book! Here's what she says:

"A cute little grammar book that uses a solve-the-mystery format to make writing rules fun."
--Mignon Fogarty, host of the award-winning Grammar Girl podcast

Thanks, Mignon!!

You can write better--right now!

Check out my writing guide, The Curious Case of the Misplaced Modifier: How to Solve the Mysteries of Weak Writing

Everyone makes mistakes, but everyone can learn to be a writing detective. You can become one, too, whether you’re a student or a professional. You don’t have to wade through pages and pages of dry grammar books to improve your writing. All you have to do is follow the clues.

This easy-to-use and friendly book will help you solve the seven mysteries of weak writing, including these cases:

• The Tantalizing Tale of Passive Voice
• The Peculiar Puzzle of the Vague -ing Word
• The Confusing Caper Concerning the Super-Long Sentence

The Curious Case of the Misplaced Modifier will teach you how to hunt down passive and wordy writing, replacing it with strong, specific and concise sentences. It’s time you follow up on these important leads. Your investigation will pay off in better writing in no time at all.