Introducing My New Project

For a few weeks now, I’ve been dropping some serious hints about what I’ve been working on. I spent hours writing almost every day, and I’m so excited to finally announce what it is. But first, a little background …

My entire life, I’ve been a writer. I don’t remember a time when I wasn’t a writer. I’m pretty sure that I wrote my first short story when I was six – unfortunately, I don’t remember what it was about – and I haven’t stopped since. Every creative writing project made me sing with happiness, and English was always my favorite subject.

So it made total sense that I would take that love with me to college. I double majored in secondary education and English, and I wrote so many papers that it’s a surprise my fingers didn’t bleed from it. In my education major, I focused on teaching English. I took classes on how to teach writing, on the reading strategies to help students foster a love of reading, on using young adult literature in the classroom, and more. I even took a class on teaching grammar, spelling, and vocabulary.

Grammar has always been my strength and something I loved teaching. I spent years in the classroom before graduating and earning my teaching license and made the permanent move down to Nashville after graduating from Vanderbilt in 2013 to teach ninth grade English. It was challenging in ways I hadn’t expected, and was extra hard on my body. With a highly-active autoimmune disease (rheumatoid arthritis), teaching was too much and I pushed myself far beyond the brink. Last July, I quit my job.

I miss it. I know it was for the best, and my health was not good for a long time after, so it was proven as definitely being for the best. But I miss teaching grammar, teaching writing, and, well, teaching. So I started thinking about what I could do with my life that still involved teaching. I tutored at a local high school and have played with the idea of (eventually) teaching a course on how to write a novel. I think I’ll wait until I have a few more under my belt before I do that.

But I started writing grammar tutorial blog posts here, and they were popular. In fact, they were much more popular than I excepted them to be. I’ve written at least ten, and I get comments and emails about how helpful they are every time. And that made me think, “I should write a book about grammar.”

So I did.

The Essential Grammar Handbook is coming out on June 2, and it’s an e-book guide for daily writing. It has all the information from my blog posts in one spot, but it covers even more topics than I’ve covered here. There are 3 parts: punctuation, sentences, and writing effectively. There are grammar rules, examples of the rules, and a practice section for you to practice them if you feel that you need to.

Members of The In-the-Know People will get access to it on May 30 and everyone else will get access on June 2. It will be $5 until June 16 before moving up to its regular $10 price. The In-the-Know People is my email list who get free printables, extra writing tips from me, and more. I email them at least once a week with something new and exciting. This is not to be confused with The Greatest People You’ll Ever Meet, my email list to whom I send a monthly newsletter with the best posts, an extra writing tip, and a free download.

Sign up for the monthly newsletter! Become one of the greatest people you will ever meet and get a recap of the best blog posts, extra writing tips, and free downloads. I will never give your email address to anyone or use it for any other purpose without your express permission.

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