Between you & me : confessions of a Comma Queen / Mary Norris.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 205-212) and index.

Confessions of a Comma Queen -- Spelling is for weirdos -- That witch! -- The problem of Heesh -- Between you and me -- Comma comma comma comma, chameleon -- Who put the hyphen in Moby-Dick? -- A dash, a semicolon, and a colon walk into a bar -- What's up with the apostrophe? -- F*ck this sh*t -- Ballad of a pencil junkie -- The million-dollar copy editor -- Some books I have found particularly helpful.

Mary Norris has spent more than three decades in The New Yorker's copy department, maintaining its celebrated high standards. Now she brings her vast experience and finely sharpened pencils to help the rest of us in a language book full of practical advice. Between You & Me features Norris's descriptions of some of the most common and vexing problems in spelling, punctuation, and usage comma faults, danglers, "who" vs. "whom," "that" vs. "which," compound words, gender-neutral language and her clear explanations of how to handle them. She draws on examples from Charles Dickens, Emily Dickinson, Henry James, and the Lord's Prayer, as well as from The Honeymooners, The Simpsons, David Foster Wallace, and Gillian Flynn. She takes us to see a copy of Noah Webster's groundbreaking Blue-Back Speller, on a quest to find out who put the hyphen in Moby-Dick, on a pilgrimage to the world's only pencil-sharpener museum, and inside the hallowed halls of The New Yorker and her work with such celebrated writers as Pauline Kael, Philip Roth, and George Saunders. Readers and writers will find in Norris neither a scold nor a softie but a new friend in love with language and alive to the glories of its use in America, even in the age of autocorrect and spell-check. As Norris writes, "The dictionary is a wonderful thing, but you can't let it push you around."