It Was the Best of Sentences, It Was the Worst of Sentences: A Writer's Guide to Crafting Killer Sentences by June Casagrande

Author:June Casagrande
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Language Arts & Disciplines, Rhetoric, English language - Rhetoric, Reference, English language - Paragraphs, Writing Skills, Paragraphs, Problems, English language - Sentences, English language, etc, Sentences, exercises, Composition & Creative Writing, Grammar & Punctuation
ISBN: 9781580087407
Publisher: Random House of Canada
Published: 2010-07-27T10:00:00+00:00

As we saw in the last chapter, a lot of the sentences people think are passive really aren't. But, with surprising frequency, these deceptively active sentences are nonetheless very bad:

Albert had been wanting to start saving and investing but, being caring, he was considering giving his savings to the woman he was seeing.

To avoid horrible sentences like this, we need to go beyond the simple concept of passive voice. We must get a better understanding of verbs and verb tenses. The following chart contains the basic tenses. You don't need to memorize their names. But you should read them at least once and note how they show when something happened and whether the action has been completed.

The progressive, which some call continuous, shows ongoing action. The progressive uses a form of to be, such as is, was, or are as an auxiliary—a helper.

The perfect shows that something is fully completed either by the time you're talking about it or by the time indicated. The perfect uses a form of have as an auxiliary.

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