One of my favourite TV shows is Lie To Me. Tim Roth plays Dr Cal Lightman, an eccentric expert in deception detection who runs his own consulting business primarily assisting lawyers and prosecutors get to the truth. There's always a story behind the story, and the trick is to work out who's lying about it. His techniques combine reading of facial microexpressions, body language, gestures and human behaviour to discern the true emotions of everyone involved; often including his own staff.

Having learned the art of stripping away people's facades to reveal what is really going on underneath, Dr Lightman has an arrogant edge about him, which is tempered by his paranoia and the painful dysfunctional relationships that he finds himself in. He sees through the white lies that other people spin to soften the real truth from him, and relies on his ability to cut through the protective shields of other people's personalities to avoid exposing his own vulnerabilities. Dr Lightman was initially driven to study microexpressions by guilt after the suicide of his mother, who fooled her psychiatrist into into thinking that she had recovered enough from her mental problems to gain weekend release from a psychiatric institution; when in fact her aim was to get out just so that should could attempt suicide. The grief surrounding his mother's death, and his inability to prevent it, is something he still hasn't really got over.

It is ironic that in his quest to get the truth out of other people, Dr Lightman and his staff often resort to theatrics and outright deception. He will set up a false scenario or make deceptive statements purely to see how the person in question will respond; will they take the bait? Will they react with fear or shame? Will they trip up and inadvertantly reveal the truth? Hell-bent on getting to the truth, he is prepared to lie and cheat in order to do it. Yet because we can see that underneath it all he's quite a flawed character, he ends up coming across as really likeable. Getting the balance just right to make this happen is where the real acting skill is, and reminds me of one of my other favourite abrasive characters, Dr House in the show House, played by Hugh Laurie.

Aside from the interesting drama that unfolds on the show, Lie To Me has a lot to teach about human behaviour and interactions. The show is based on the scientific work of Paul Ekman, a psychologist who has studied the relationship between emotions and facial microexpressions. Main characters in the show refer to emotional indications in the expressions or mannerisms of the people they are working with, based on Ekman's work. We see realistic portrayals of guilt, shame, honesty, anger, resentment, scorn and other emotions, cleverly intercut with pictures of known celebrities in the same emotional states while going into ad breaks. Ekman's research has found that most people are relatively poor at reading facial microexpressions, but can be trained quite quickly to become better at empathising with other people through the use of a microexpression training set. Not only are we all fascinated by lying, and how to detect it, but this basis in real science makes for an intelligent drama.

The relationships between the main characters working with and for Dr Lightman always seem to be coloured by the absolute requirement to be honest with each other. Any deception is immediately picked up, given that they're all trained to recognise it instinctively. This seems to add to the tension between them, and particularly between Dr Lightman and his most senior colleague Dr Gillian Foster, played by Kellie Williams. Another character Eli Loker, played by Brendan Hines, subscribes to the theory of radical honesty described in the book Radical Honesty by psychologist Brad Blanton, which really blew me away when I read it recently. As a result, Loker often appears abrupt in his interactions with other characters. Blanton's theory is that most human stress is caused by our unwillingness, inability, or inculcation to avoid being really truthful with other people, especially in difficult circumstances. Sounds great in theory, but Loker's character suggests that doing so all the time becomes awkward and may even distance us from other people.

All good drama has things to teach about human interactions, but it's rare that the lessons are as obvious as they are in Lie To Me. Yet it works. I think they've got a good balance between plots that are dramatically interesting, and the quite overt inclusion of information about when someone is lying, shameful, or being honest. Sometimes the plots seem a bit far-fetched; Cal Lightman seems to attract way more than his fair share of trouble to feed his underlying paranoia. Occasional plot devices push me beyond the limits of my ability to suspend disbelief and just get lost in the action. But overall, I find Lie To Me fascinating for both the drama and what it has to teach about human dynamics, human interactions, and the art of reading other people's true emotions; despite what they may say they are thinking or feeling at the time.

Lie To Me is a post from Graham Stoney: Writer, Speaker, Communicator - Set Yourself Free!

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See larger image Radical Honesty: How to Transform Your Life by Telling the Truth (Paperback) By (author) Dr. Brad Blanton I was blown away by this brilliant book; it totally had me hooked. The author puts the boot straight into the curse of moralism as the cause of our obsessive self-critical thinking and resulting inability to be free to be ourselves, and act instinctively instead of regimentally. He cites two modern-day institutions as prime examples that perpetuate moralism: lawyers and the legal system, and the Catholic church; both of which are rich sources of clients in his psychotherapy practice. By pushing doctrines and sets of rules about what’s right and wrong, and how people should behave, these institutions and others like them enslave people to black-and-white thinking that goes against the inherent contradictions of life as a human being. The result is that we end up stuck in our head, beating ourselves up over natural behaviour and trying to work out analytically what behaviour we think is right, rather than actually living authentically. Along the way, we learn to lie when what we want to say and do differs from what other uptight people around us seem to deem acceptable. We end up thinking this will gain us approval from other people and give us a problem-free life. In fact, we end up dissociated from ourselves, disconnected from other people, and stressed out… all in a vain attempt to avoid offending people whose opinion doesn’t really matter anyway, and the resulting conflict which we imagine will be unbearable. Liberation of our beings from the constraints of our mind turns out to be simple: start telling the truth, and deal with the consequences. Blanton breaks truth-telling down into 3 levels: Revealing the facts Honesty about current thoughts and feelings Admitting that we are not who we have been pretending to be Each succeeding level leads to greater openness, vulnerability, connection with others, and authenticity. Along with greater potential for conflict with defensive people operating out of fear on a lower level. Staying at level 3 all the time is hard work, and pretty much impossible. Level 2 is achievable, and gives you huge relationship breakthroughs. Most people don’t even operate at level 1 most of the time. My family of origin didn’t even do level 1 very well. Most of my parent’s arguments were disagreements about facts revealed in previous arguments. That meant they never even got close to level 2. If you’re attacked about your version of the facts, you’re not about to reveal feelings which are even more intangible and open to ridicule, if that’s what your opponent is into. So I grew up learning that being fundamentally honest wasn’t really a good thing. I fooled myself into thinking that I was an honest, nice guy; when in fact I held back so much that I was downright deceptive and even manipulative. I didn’t know that a man can get his needs met by being open and honest about them, so I learned to withhold and lie instead. I just did it in a way that seemed nice enough and wouldn't fit most people's definition of a lie, but really I was holding back big time; something I'm still learning to break out of. The chapter on dealing with anger was particularly illuminating for me. If you find yourself never getting angry, it’s possible that you’ve repressed your anger so much that you barely even feel it. This has definitely been the case for me, as my mother was verbally abusive and my father violent when they were angry; so I vowed never to follow them as role models. But men who are incapable of expressing anger act like unattractive wimps. The antidote to this is to start expressing your resentment to people, and get over your fear of how they will respond. I recently told a woman that I resented her for keeping me waiting when I turned up for a lunch date; something I previously would not have done for fear of offending. Not only did she apologize, but even though it clearly made her feel bad, she became much more engaged in our interaction as a result. A key point that Blanton makes is that emotions are transitory when they are freely expressed. They only hang around when we bottle them up. So if we express anger towards someone else in a constructive manner, it dissipates. We need to be aware of this when we’re on the receiving end too; just because someone is angry today doesn’t mean they will still be tomorrow. This has been another big learning for me, having experienced many family arguments where an emotion, opinion or attitude expressed at one point in time is used as ammunition for all future arguments. Don’t take other people’s feelings personally. Someone can be angry with us right now, and loving us a minute later. This sharing of emotions, even of seemingly negative ones, builds intimacy, trust, and allows opportunities for forgiveness. Of course it needs to be done constructively, and the book gives a formula for doing this especially with anger, since it’s the emotion we often struggle with expressing constructively. Radical honesty can be disarming, but is ultimately attractive to other people. We end up having more respect for someone who is honest and straight with us, even if they disagree with them or find their opinions or emotions questionable, than someone who is hard to pin down or changes their tune according to other people's views. I highly recommend this book to anyone who finds themselves holding back around other people, and wants to live a more connected, less self-critical life. It’s absolute gold. List Price: $15.00 USD New From: $8.75 In Stock Used from: $3.50 In Stock

Radical Honesty by Brad Blanton is a post from Graham Stoney: Writer, Speaker, Communicator - Set Yourself Free!

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I've concluded that our ability to communicate authentically with other people is the most important life skill that we can possess. We often spend a great deal of our education learning how to analyse, think, solve problems, and understand how things work; but tend to downplay the importance of subjects that teach us how to communicate. The ability to communicate, inspire and influence other people is also a key leadership skill. Whether in business, relationships, or just in our personal lives, our ability to communicate our thoughts, feelings and ideas to other people is absolutely crucial to our success... and ultimately our happiness.

For the past couple of years, I've been improving my communication and leadership skills as a member of Chatswood Communicators Toastmasters club.  I have to admit that I wasn't really thinking of becoming a world-class communicator when I first came across Toastmasters. In fact, I was dragged along to my first club meeting by a very passionate Toastmaster friend of mine I met at a Ceroc dance class, who wanted me to partner her for a dance demonstration. At the time, I thought "Hmm... this looks like fun. But I'd rather be dancing!". Two years later suffering from chronic fatigue, I had to give up dancing and decided that rather than sitting around at home feeling miserable, I may as well be out at Toastmasters learning how to communicate better with other people.

Effective communication wasn't a big part of the family I grew up in. In fact, it's fair to say that my parents demonstrated the importance of good communication by showing just how badly things can go when you don't have it. They would talk cross-purposes without actually connecting or revealing anything personal about themselves.

Powerful communicators tell stories laden with their true emotions, because this connects them with their audience. If we didn't grow up with this being role-modeled for us naturally, it's something we need to learn for ourselves. The thing I like about Toastmasters is that it offers a safe , mutually supportive environment to practise the art of communicating our message with other people. It's a training ground where I can experiment with different ideas, and get constructive feedback on them before heading out into the "real world" to spin my stories in front of potential clients, friends, business partners, or wherever I want to speak.

My club has people from diverse backgrounds all of whom are there for their own reasons. Some want to improve their general self-confidence, some need extra training for their current or future job roles, and others want to learn how to run seminars promoting their product or business. Toastmasters as a whole tends to attract people who are interested in self-development and are often quite entrepreneurial, which makes for an interesting group of people to hang around with.

Being an impatient kind of guy, once I decided I wanted to get into the whole public speaking thing I wanted to get kick-started as quickly as I could. So I took the SpeechCraft introductory public speaking course run by the club. My previous experience in community theatre definitely helped me here, and I found it was a fairly natural transition from telling someone else's scripted story on stage, to telling stories of my own. After having a lot of fun at SpeechCraft, I joined the club so I could have a regular forum to practise in and continue to develop my skills. Later down the track I decided to take the plunge and lead the SpeechCraft course myself, which was also a great experience. I definitely learned a lot more about public speaking when I started teaching it to other people.

There are Toastmasters clubs literally all over the world, and you can find one near you on the Toastmasters International Website. The clubs are deliberately kept to a relatively small and manageable size of around 20 regular members at each meeting, so that the environment isn't intimidating for newcomers. So many clubs means a lot of administrative support is required to keep the whole organisation going, which is where the leadership training side of things comes in. Keeping a club of any sort running involves a leadership team, and a large organisation like Toastmasters needs leaders at all of the many levels in it's hierarchy. During the 2009/10 financial year I became President of my club, which was an excellent opportunity to get more involved, practise some leadership skills and network more widely with others in the organisation.

To keep people on their game, Toastmasters also runs a number of speech competitions for members, the most prestigious being the International Speech Contest, the winner of which gets crowned the World Champion of Public Speaking. These guys are typically professional speakers who I find completely inspiring. One day I want to up there myself, telling my stories to the world.

If you're recognised the value of communication skills in your work, business or just life generally, I recommend checking out Toastmasters. There you'll find a like-minded group of people with tremendous experience to learn from. If you're particularly time-poor or have an immediate need like a wedding speech or a one-off business presentation to do, give SpeechCraft a go. Or if you're committed to getting the most out of life by working on your communication skills longer term, find a club near you and join up.

Communication, Public Speaking, and Leadership Skills Development at Toastmasters is a post from Graham Stoney: Writer, Speaker, Communicator - Set Yourself Free!

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My first book, on attracting women, was created using the OpenOffice.org 3.1 Office Productivity Suite. I like OpenOffice because it's free, is community-supported, and has most of the features that I really need to get my job done. Here's my experience using it on seriously sized projects of over 200 pages.

I recently finished the 3^rd draft of a 450 page book, so I know what it's like to use OpenOffice.org Writer to create and edit a significant work with over 30 chapters, a two-level table of contents, and several pictures. I also used OpenOffice.org Draw for the cover design, and PDF export to generate files to send to Lulu for printing. I was pleased to find that OpenOffice.org was up to the task, but there were a few quirks I had to navigate and some missing features which made the task more painful than I would have liked.

I partitioned my book as one sub-document per chapter with a master document containing the top-level table of contents and separating pages for the various sections. This approach worked really well because the text is huge; over 120,000 words. By avoiding applying formatting directly to paragraphs and using styles consistently, I could make global style changes just by editing the styles in the master document. I could also set the page size in the master document to what I needed for publishing, while leaving the page sizes in the sub-documents more appropriate for easy editing on-screen.

If you want to write a book using OpenOffice.org, here are my tips:

• Put each chapter in a separate file and use a master document to tie them together.
• Avoid applying formatting directly; always use styles.
• Use the standard paragraph styles like Heading 1, Heading 2 etc. and Text Body.
• Don't use Default as your text style, use Text Body.
• Set the page styles in your master document to the printed page size, but leave each chapter with the default page size so it's easier to edit them on-screen.
• Note that the styles in your master document override those in your chapters.
• Worry about appearance later; it's easy to change if you've used styles consistently and this lets you focus on what you want to say.
• Use Tools -> Outline Numbering to give your document structure; but beware it has limitations.
• Ask for help when you get stuck, on the OpenOffice.org Community Forum.
• Use a screen-reader or text-to-speech program to help you spot typos during editing.

I struggled somewhat to get OpenOffice.org to do everything I wanted; partly because I'd never written such a large document before and needed to use features I had never used before, and partly because I ran into a number of bugs and missing or brain-dead features. Some of these may be due to OpenOffice.org's compatibility with Microsoft Word, but in other areas OpenOffice.org appears to lag behind Word slightly. Most of these issues were already reported in the OpenOffice.org project issue tracking database. OpenOffice.org keeps improving, and some issues that used to get in my way, like that document outlining was half-baked in 2.4 have now been improved in 3.1.

The main issues that got in my way were:

• The layout engine can hang on complex documents.
• You can't load styles from a master document into a sub-document directly.
• Putting the page numbers in the header margin was tricky.
• Captions added to frames appear within the frame rather than above/below it.
• Scaling objects in Draw doesn't scale contained text.
• Objects don't remain centred when generating HTML for the web.
• No text-to-speech/screen-reader integration.

I sometimes had paragraphs in sub-documents inadvertently acquire formatting information which the styles in my master document didn't override. I never quite worked out why, and it was often hard to detect this since the difference was not visually obvious and there is no way to identify when formatting has been applied manually vs coming from a style. Removing the manual formatting information from these paragraphs with Format -> Default Formatting fixed the problem; but this also removed formatting like italicisation unless I was paying close attention.

Time spent struggling with these sort of problems was time not spent on writing. Nevertheless, they say you get what you pay for, and in this case I got far more than that. OpenOffice.org is free, and I've used expensive old Microsoft Word in the past and had problems with it, too. The other cool thing is that, being an open source project, I could get information about these problems in the issue-tracking database, vote for getting them fixed, and even fix them myself if I really wanted to. And I almost did, but my aim was to write rather than fix bugs, so my motivation ran out. I made this laundry-list of complaints not because I want to be critical or bite the hand that feeds me, but in the hope that they will be prioritised to make OpenOffice.org even better.

I used OpenOffice.org Draw for my one-piece cover design, and found that it worked well. Start by setting your dimensions to inches in Tools->Options->OpenOffice.org Draw->General->Unit of Measurement, since all the dimensions Lulu gives you are in inches. Then draw your front and back cover of the exact size according to the paper size you plan to use. Once you are happy with the designs, extend the objects on the appropriate borders into the bleed area. Then the trick is to group the front and back cover objects as separate groups, and then right-click on the front cover group and use the Position and Size object inspector to position the edge of the front cover group precisely according to the final width of your spine. Note that you won't know the spine width until you have the final PDF of your content completed.

If you want to manipulate images for use in your book using OpenOffice.org Draw, you may have trouble because you can't easily set the image resolution when exporting from Draw. To work around this problem, install this extension.

Chances are that you just want a word processor for simple documents; you're probably not writing a full-length novel. And even if you are, OpenOffice.org is up to the task. Despite my complaints, I highly recommend OpenOffice.org; and the more users it has, the better it gets.

Writing a book using OpenOffice.org is a post from Graham Stoney: Writer, Speaker, Communicator - Set Yourself Free!

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OK, I admit it. I lied today. I don't normally do that; I'm a terrible liar in fact. I'm sure it goes back to when I was a kid and how my mother could always tell when I was lying. She wasn't the sort of person you wanted to get on the wrong side of. So I'm badly out of practice. But I'm working on it.

Or rather, I've actually been working on becoming a more persuasive and powerful communicator. I've joined Toastmasters. I'm doing workshops on public speaking, sales and marketing. I'm reading The 48 Laws of Power. This last one is all a bit Machiavellian for me, and if taken literally the laws involve a lot more deception than I'm really comfortable with. But I'm learning. And today it came in handy.

I decided that time to get ADSL2+ broadband is long overdue, but there's a problem: my phone number isn't “portable”. A couple of Internet and phone companies with better deals than my current provider told me I can't switch to them unless I get a new number. I wasn't all that keen on having to change phone numbers, tell everyone I know and reprint 2000 business cards. So I thought I'd just stick with my current phone company despite the extra cost. I gave them a call, and talked to a helpful sales consultant. Let's call him Jesse, because that's what his name was. Jesse was very friendly, and about as helpful as someone could be while explaining that they couldn't possibly do what I really wanted. Even though I'm an existing customer, they couldn't transfer the number to their new ADSL2+ equipment in the telephone exchange. So no matter what I did, I needed a new phone number in order to get ADSL2+. My only reason for sticking with them in the first place was the vain hope that I wouldn't have to change phone numbers, and with this hope dashed I decided I might as well switch carriers as well and get the better deal.

After about 45 minutes of going through the scenarios with Jesse, I concluded that the simplest solution was to get my current phone company to change my phone number, and then switch to the new cheaper guys once that was done. Now Jesse couldn't do this directly because he was from the sales department. But he could put me through to the service department that could help me. Jesse suggested that to avoid having to go through the whole rigmarole again, I just tell the guy in the service department that I want to change phone numbers because I'm getting nuisance calls. In other words, he suggested I lie.

Jesse put my call straight through to a guy in the phone company's customer service department, who I'll call Manesh, because once again that was his name. I liked Manesh, because he engaged in a little small-talk to build rapport with me, and he didn't pretend that he wasn't in a call center in India. “How's the weather over there today?” he asked.

“Good, good, thanks.”, I replied honestly while planning my deception.

“Great, because it was 44 degrees here in India yesterday!”. He seemed a friendly straight-shooter, and I liked him immediately.

“So what can I do for you today?”, he asked cheerfully.

“Well, you see, I'm getting all these harassing phone calls and I'm really over it. So I want to change my phone number please”, I lied. Straight into it. Felt pretty good too, I must say. Confident, and strong.

Manesh took pity on me, and was more than happy to relieve me of these bogus nuisance calls by changing my number. “I'll even waive the number-change fee, given that it is a case of harassment”, he said. He went on to outline the procedure for police involvement if it continued after the change:

“Oh, I really hope that won't be necessary, but thanks so much for letting me know just in case.”

Manesh also suggested a silent/unlisted number, at extra charge. Given that I'm not running from any underworld figures and have a fairly mundane life that doesn't generally make me the target of hatred from strangers, I'd rather not be unlisted. I kind of like the idea that friends, even ones I haven't met yet, can find me just by looking me up in the phone book. But what about my harassing caller? “Actually, I think it's some sort of fax machine or modem that keeps ringing me every 10 minutes. So I don't really need an unlisted number.”, the lie grew.

He was pretty cool with that, and initiated the number change. Then he suggested I could get my old number redirected to the new one. “You can do that? Yeah, that would be great!” I enthused. That way friends who don't know I've changed my number can still get in touch.

Oh, but what about that nuisance caller? “Sorry... you won't want to redirect your old number because then the nuisance caller will still come straight through to you.”, Manesh pointed out helpfully. No, of course not. Well, actually...

A little more deliberation and Manesh mentioned that I could have a recorded message on my old number, redirection, or both. “A recorded message would be great, because I think it's just a fax machine hassling me. A machine won't get the message, but other people will be able to find my new number. Yeah, let's go with a recorded message. Can I change it to redirect the calls later, if the nuisance caller stops?”

“Of course.”

“Great!”

“OK, I've put your request into the system as an emergency request because of your nuisance caller. It should be changed within 24 hours. I will ring you back tomorrow to organize the redirection message.”

“You'll ring me?”

“Yes Sir”, Manesh replied in perfect Indian English.

Wow. I couldn't believe it. None of this waiting-on-hold-for-hours crap. They were going to ring me. My previous major interaction with this same company 4 years ago didn't go anywhere near this well: I was moving house and wanted to keep my existing Internet address and phone number; apparently an “unusual” request according to their complaints department to whom I eventually had to go in order to get what I wanted.

This time, I got what I wanted much more easily just by lying. I only had to lie a little though; it's not that bad, is it? And it saved us both a whole heap of time. But it bothers me that I live in a world where some things just go more smoothly when you lie. It shouldn't be like that. People should be honest. Other people should respect that. I should get what I want be being straight with people up-front. This should always work in every relationship I have.

Oh-oh; I'm should-ing all over myself again. Life is easier and ultimately less frustrating and/or stressful when I can accept that things are the way they are, not the way I think they should be. Odd that I should learn this lesson once again by, of all things, lying to the phone company though.

I lied to the guy from the phone company today is a post from Graham Stoney: Writer, Speaker, Communicator - Set Yourself Free!

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See larger image Cassell's Guide to Written English (Paperback) By (author) James Aitchison I read this book because I wanted to improve my writing by gaining a better understanding of the formal structure of written English, so I would know what the rules are and when I am breaking them. The author makes the point that breaking the rules unknowingly will alienate some of your readers, undermine your authority in your chosen subject area, and just plain distract and annoy more pedantic types; so you'd better be aware of when you're doing it. The book does an amicable job of covering the various different types of speech, sentence construction, use of rhythm in writing, avoiding repetition and monotony; and more. I found the sections on the deeper intricacies of phrasing almost sleep-inducing; "almost" being a shame because I was suffering quite bad insomnia at the time, and could have done with something that forcibly made me nod off. The author makes seemingly arbitrary choices about what is and what isn't "standard written English" without reference to any other authority; but then I'm not sure there really is an official authority on the subject and I guess he's as good an authority as anyone else. At least he can say he's published a book on the subject. In places he points out the folly of attempting to "correct" grammatical innovations in a language which is continually evolving, and notes that slang or other casual constructs have been integrated into standard English over time; in other places he simply states that something is or isn't "standard". I suppose like any author, he is merely stating his opinion, regardless of whether he points this out or not. At times the tone appeared a little elitist; but I'd expect that of someone who chose to write a book describing what is and what isn't correct in terms of grammar and spelling. I would have liked the book to cover some of the variants in use in English, principally the difference between British and American English. Ideally I'd like to know how to write and spell in a style with allows some sort of compromise between the two; but perhaps this is impossible. For the most part though, I learned a lot; and there is a lot more in the book that I could have learned too. I should now be able to fluently describe the difference between an adverb and an adjective; if I had only been paying more attention. I wouldn't describe the book as entertaining, but think it would be tremendously difficult to write a book on such a subject that was. If I find one, I'll let you know. In the mean time, Cassell's Guide To Written English does a good job and covers its subject matter thoroughly. Used from: $2.00 In Stock

Cassell’s Guide To Written English by James Aitchison is a post from Graham Stoney: Writer, Speaker, Communicator - Set Yourself Free!

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3. The Elements Of Style by Strunk and White

See larger image The Elements of Style: 50th Anniversary Edition (Hardcover) By (author) William Strunk, E. B. White I'm embarrassed to say that when I decided to become a writer, it was about 18 months before I got around to picking up this seminal work on the craft. To my folly, I had churned out two drafts of my first book, and hundreds of other pages of content for other works before even acquainting myself with the basic wisdom enshrined in this book. This is a thin book, and deliberately so; one of its main points is that good writing should be concise. "Let every word tell." It's got lots of great advice, but maybe it's a bit too thin, so I suggest you also check out the Cassell's Guide To Written English too. If you want to be taken seriously in the written word, Strunk & White is essential reading, if only so you can drop the name around other writers and boost your street cred. List Price: $19.95 USD New From: $11.37 In Stock Used from: $6.99 In Stock

The Elements Of Style by Strunk and White is a post from Graham Stoney: Writer, Speaker, Communicator - Set Yourself Free!

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