General Writing Style Guides

Many books are published about writing and writing skills, and the list that follows is not meant to be all-inclusive — but the best writing style guides.

We talked with college professors and professional writers and editors and developed what they think is a list of the best resources for you. These resources provide you with information about general rules of English writing and grammar.

If you are looking for more subject-specific writing style guides, then go to Subject-Specific Writing Style Guides.

You may also want to go to the EnhanceMyWriting.com’s Reference Libraries Page to see about the availability of the books in your area.

Finally, you may also want to see if there is an online version of the style guide by visiting Writing Reference Sites on the Web.

All the books in this section come highly recommended, but if we had to choose a few “must use” from the collection below, we would include Bernstein’s The Careful Writer; Strunk and White’s The Elements of Style; Cook’s Line by Line; Ross-Larson’s Edit Yourself; Miles, Bertonasco, and Karns’ Prose Style; Zinsser’s On Writing Well; and Elbow’s Writing with Power.

Featured General Style Book

  • The Elements of Style (2000, 4th edition), by William Strunk Jr. and E.B.White. New York: Macmillan.

The Other Style Guides