The McGraw-Hill Handbook of English Grammar and Usage

This book is very helpful for grammar correction section in competitive exam.

Finally there a grammar book which unlike other grammar books doesn't go too much into unnecessary technicalities of the grammar which make learning difficult at best. From learners perspective this book focus on necessary and required fundamentals and leave the fluff and non-sense grammar stuff. I especially like the flow of the book. It nicely covers the fundamentals of English grammar in about 120 pages (just 120 pages with plenty of explanation) and the rest about 200 pages on the common errors. I just love it and I think this is the book which would perfectly suit my 10 year old who is just getting exposed to technicality of the English language. I think at the end of the day if anyone who can't figure out which part of the sentence belongs to which part of the speech then that book has failed its readers. This book is quite a gem.

It's really excellent Book..very deep and practical Book. Indeed very good book for those have basic grammar concept.

Awesome book but I think not good for beginners.

Not good

My bible for English grammar.

This is an expensive book which doesn't deal with detailed english grammar but deals with shortcuts to identify parts of speech,different types of phrases, clauses,etc.That's it.

A really good book for beginners and intermediate learners.This book doesnt take you into the technical points but teaches you in a easy and effective manner.You can equip yourself with the concepts but you really have to buy another book for practice as book consists only examples.Price is somewhat high but you cant ignore the quality.

This book is very informative. The second part is the best. Author applied scientific approach in selecting book material.It helped me a lot after reading it.

This book contains a great deal of the material that was in Lester's magnum opus,  Grammar and Usage in the Classroom (2nd Edition) . How I adored that book!, and I have lingering bitterness that it was never reissued in another printing. The previous book casts a long shadow on this one, since it draws so heavily on it with the same format, section material, and even the same example sentences.A good book review discusses a book's purpose and whether it achieves it, the intended audience, and so forth. The best thing to do is to let this book speak for itself. This is from the Introduction:"Grammar books are commonplace. What makes this one different? Following are seven features that set this book apart:*separating grammar and usage: Part I focuses on the grammatical terminology used to describe language. Part II goes a step further by covering the rules and conventions--the "prescriptions" for proper language, or what you should and should not do in formal communication. Rather than conflate these two issues (description versus prescription), this book separates them so readers can pay attention to the parts that matter most to them.*A nontechnical approach: You do not have to be a grammarian or linguist to use this book. Part I covers the technical aspects of grammar, but we assume our readers do not necessarily have a background in this area. More importantly, Part II does not rely on Part I or on previous knowledge of formal grammar.*Accessible, bottom-line information: Part II in particular offers bottom-line definitions, hints, and rules that summarize the least you need to know about grammar and usage.*More than just the bottom line: Most reference books on grammar stop with the bottom-line rules and with maybe an example or two. The problem is that almost every grammar rule is not self-explanatory. If it were, you would not need a book on grammar at this point in your life. Unlike most reference books on grammar, ours gives a thorough explanation so that you can better understand the rules, exceptions, and methods for correcting an error. Our goal is for you to know how to avoid problems so you will not need this or any other grammar book later. Thus, we provide enough information so you can truly understand and learn.*A focus on the most important aspects of grammar and usage: To avoid overwhelming our readers, this book focuses on what matters the most. Neither Part I nor Part II covers every aspect of formal English. Instead, Part I deals with the grammatical terminology and information that are most useful and common. Part II deals with the most serious or most frequent errors in formal English.*Clearly marked examples of correct and incorrect sentences: People learn more from examples, so we include plenty. But research indicates that many people who are given incorrect examples only remember how to create these errors. Often readers do not know that the examples are actually incorrect, or they only remember seeing mistakes, meaning all they learn is how to commit an error. In this book we clearly mark errors (with an X); other examples are correct. We attempt to include at least as many correct examples are errors.*A focus on traditional grammar with insights from modern approaches: In school the most common approach to grammar is a traditional scheme based on certain parts of speech, functions, and definitions that, as a whole, are standard throughout the English-speaking world. Our book uses this system as a basis. However, along the way we draw on insights from other theories of grammar and language. For example, Part II is largely based on the notion that people use intuitive tips that tell them if they are putting a sentence together properly. This notion builds on modern grammatical theories that assume people learn a language by subconsciously drawing on particular tests and procedures. In other words, our book describes English in ways that might sound familiar to those who studied grammar in school, but we also draw on more recent perspectives of how people naturally learn and improve their language skills."While the book uses traditional grammar as a launching point, the usage tests throughout the text are clearly from Chomsky's Transformational Grammar, and they're wonderfully useful. Here's one small example from the book:The Pair Test: if you can pair up a modifying word with a noun, then that word is an adjective.example phrase: that absolutely dreadful old manthat manX absolutely mandreadful manold manBy drawing on one's innate sense of what sounds good together and which combinations sound weird, the native speaker of English will know from this test that "absolutely" is not an adjective and it can't be paired with a noun, all without needing the grammatical terminology to describe it. This book (and its predecessor) does a terrific job in helping the reader to determine where the errors are so they can be fixed quickly without getting bogged down in technical jargon. The usage tests rely on native English speakers' subconscious absorption of grammar rules, and because of this, this book, while it may be useful in many regards, isn't intended for ESL students or TOEFL study. Instead, ESL students and tutors should take a look at Lester's  McGraw-Hill's Essential ESL Grammar: A Handbook for Intermediate and Advanced ESL Students (McGraw-Hill ESL References)  .The glossary in Part II is VERY useful for defining concepts quickly, and the index is pretty thorough and reliable. You gotta love a good index; it's indispensable.I try to be aware of what the author intends the book to do versus what I want it to do and not to confuse the two. The authors want Handbook of English Grammar and Usage to be a reference guide that teaches the reader so well that he or she will no longer need the book. That's a laudable goal, but I think in this case the best way to do that is to include exercises for the reader to work his or her way through to test understanding of the concepts (as Grammar and Usage in the Classroom does). Lester wrote  English Grammar Drills  , and I wonder if it wasn't meant as a companion volume to this one. Yes, this book does omit certain topics such as the subjunctive, but the aim is to cover the most important aspects of grammar. Most high school and college students or business people aren't struggling with that. Be that as it may, I suggest one look elsewhere to learn about using the subjunctive. ; - )McGraw-Hill Handbook of English Grammar and Usage is a very useful, accessible, affordable, insightful (and at times funny) book for the beginner or someone who needs to brush up on grammar skills. It's one of the very best you'll find at this level. Grammar and Usage in the Classroom (2nd Edition)McGraw-Hill's Essential ESL Grammar: A Handbook for Intermediate and Advanced ESL Students (McGraw-Hill ESL References)English Grammar Drills

First of, this book is for American English. I was looking for a grammar book for someone else, and thought I'd give it a read. I thought maybe I'll get a thing or two out of it. Boy, was I wrong! I learned something in basically every single chapter of the book. Even the simple explanations about Grammar 101 in the beginning were helpful. E.g. I never quite understood what an adverb is. I know, this is very fundamental stuff, but for some reason, I never quite understood it and never really cared to learn it.The book has a Grammar 101 section which goes over the basics of the English language. Some of those sections can get quite tedious, but I think it is worth while to go through them to better understand the Usage chapters. The Usage chapters go over some very common grammatical errors like subject-verb agreement errors, which a lot of non-native English speakers make. But it also goes over how to use commas, semicolons, colons, quotation marks and lots of other very interesting tid-bits. Comma usage, for example, has always been a complete mystery to me, but now I know a lot more about it. I'm sure I still make tons of comma placement errors, probably many in this very review, but at least I have some understanding about it now. I will re-read that particular chapter many times in the future.One surprising fact about the book is, that it is not boring at all, at least for me. I couldn't put the book down because it was so interesting. Maybe that's just me, but I did not expect a grammar book to be interesting at all.Bottom line, I think anybody who wants to improve their English, non-native or native speaker (I'm a non-native speaker), should read this book. I'll guarantee you, that you will learn a thing or two, but most likely a lot more.

This book was recommended to me by a professional proofreader as the best working guide to English grammar. It is an excellent text and very clearly written. It covers most of what I was looking for, although it seems to overlook the subjunctive. The writers explain grammatical concepts in the context both of modern transformational grammar, and of traditional grammar, which is extremely helpful.

As someone who managed to avoid learning anything in 12 years of English classes ("I already speak it, why do I need to waste my time in these classes"), I'd been bitten in the butt by my inability to clearly and concisely express myself. This was particularly embarrassing and troublesome at work when sending emails to superiors or presenting projects to a group.I needed to learn how to properly write a sentence, and to do this, I needed to learn grammar. My search for the perfect grammar book was tough. Most were meant for readers who already had a moderate understanding of grammar. The rest seemed to be meant for ESL students. NONE seemed to offer what I needed: A foundational review of the basic concepts of grammar, and instructions on how to use these concepts to create clear and concise writings.Finally I found this book, and it was exactly what I needed. I now have a more in-depth understanding of grammar than most of my coworkers, and though my writing may not be quite as good as theirs, it has improved and continues to do so.As a final note, I should mention that this booked helped me only because I was very motivated to improve my writing. I have read each chapter multiple times, and practiced what I read by parsing sentences in the newspaper. And though my writing is much improved, I still spend quite a bit of time reviewing everything I write, making sure it follows the rules this book has taught me; however, with continued practice I expect that proper writing will eventually come with ease.