Though this book is on grammar, it is not that hard. It tries to make the subject simple, fun, and the most important thing, easy to remember.

You'll need to make a review of some grammar, but the book is self-contained to that purpose, and it gives you all necessary tools for the work. These tools will help you to understand how to write and speak better English, and if they were not enough for you, every "rule" has examples and these examples, in turn, are explained when needed.

The book recognizes English is a changing language, so there are exceptions for some rules, but it shows you the most general exceptions and helps you to decide which road you should take.

Nonnative English speakers, beware: The book has "fun parts" that could be difficult to understand. If you are not an intermediate or advanced speaker of English, better look for another book.

For Spanish speakers:

este es un buen libro para practicar y aprender gramática inglesa, pero está orientado a hablantes nativos del idioma, no a estudiantes. Si no están en un nivel avanzado, otro libro puede ser mejor.

Barry Tarshis has given us a remarkably well done guidebook to that often complicated language we call "English". It is a priceless helping hand for everyone - students, writers, professionals, and just plain folks. Bravo Mr. Tarshis!

I use it and recommend it to many of my fellow students that are wading their way through college. Especially great for any international folk...the English language is a crazy beast.

I having read this book, I found it to contain a wealth of practical financial strategies. This book contains information of great use for everyone, both those in and out of the financial planning field. It was of great use to me in developing a financial plan specifically tailored to my situation. I am just thirty and this book provided me a paved road map of how to achieve financial security with limited risk. What more could one look for in a book?

I highly recommend this book and its upcoming revisions.

I purchased this book on a whim expecting another mediocre book on IT business investment. Instead I got a deeply influential book about how to effectively assure project success and realize best value from IT investments.

This book maintains a brisk, but easy-to-follow pace - by page 18 you get nine unwarranted beliefs about the reasons who IT initiatives fail and well crafted counter arguments to dispel them. This leads into a well written chapter on pathologies of failure and patterns of disaster, which the rest of the book addresses in the form of a methodology that integrates risk, value and gap analysis to give a clear map to assuring success.

Part I contains seven chapters that discuss the underlying elements of the methods, including risk management, value management, process management, measurement and assessment. These are the knowledge areas and tools. Among the tools are business initiative value assessments, business knowledge value, progress and performance curves, and risk-to-value analysis.

Part II consists of seven more chapters that provide case studies to illustrate a failed project and how the authors' methods apply. Five of the chapters in this section deal in detail with closing leadership, knowledge, process, resources and judgement gaps. One of the core measurements used is knowledge, experience and performance used to identify and close gaps that threaten project and IT initiatives.

I especially liked the way the authors frame value propositions, which includes a list of 22 major values (each of which can have many sub values), and how these are divided into hard and soft values. What makes this useful is the fact that each value can be quantified. These are augmented by five key questions about the value proposition to validate it. In each of the gaps discussed in Part II are equally useful checklists and questions. This material transforms the authors' approach from theory to the practical and is one of the reasons I was deeply influenced by the book.

There are also parts of the book that I take issue with: the authors never miss an opportunity to 'plug' their consulting company. This is more of an irritant than a real problem. Also, as I was reading the book it seemed as though I would need their services in order to get a complete picture. As it turns out everything you need is in the book, but it was still a distraction. Quibbles aside I think that the approach the authors give in this book and the valuable checklists and questionnaires that are included make this one of the best books one can reference for assuring the success of IT initiatives.

I ran across this book by accident but the content as well as Barry's insights motivated me to purchase 10 more copies for my salespeople. Barry shares a rare blend of facts, insights and motivation- as well as pertinent quotes from classics to underscore his subjects. I want his future book on sales management!

The complete revision of Chapter 5, Factoring Polynomials greatly enhances the students ability to understand factoring by grouping. It is a far easier process than the trial and error in previous editions. The graphics are also greatly improved, but the visibility of the check yourself exercises, found in the chapters, has been absurdly diminished! -1 star for that error in judgement!