The Nuts and Bolts of College Writing

Michael Harvey

1 Haven't read it but if it's anything like the website...
...it'll be good. The Nuts and Bolts Website helped me turn a C minus literary criticism paper (I was devastated - I couldn't figure out what I had done wrong) into an A. My particular problem is structuring my ideas logically and building a solid argument. This site, along with an hour with a good tutor ("No, what you have here is NOT a thesis statement!"), and another hour with my eminently logical husband (he's an engineer who works a lot with lawyers) helped me finally understand that I had to, in effect, build a path with brick walls on either side of it, leading my reader along by the hand, rather than wandering all over the countryside to every distraction, expecting my reader to keep up with my desultory ramblings and then find his own way back to the road. And how to do it.

The site is, unlike me, clear, methodical, and understandable, which is very important when you just can't grasp something because it's in your Writer's Blindspot.

I'm buying the book in case the Website ever goes down.

2 Hip, Handy, and Highly Literate
I first encountered "Nuts and Bolts" several years ago, when it was just a web-site. Back then, Yahoo! gave it one of their "cool sites" awards (complete with cute little sunglasses.) It became such a hit on the web, Hackett decided to give Professor Harvey a publishing contract.

Its great that they did, because the other college writing handbooks are either deadly dull or sprouting whiskers. Nuts and Bolts is neither dry nor bewhiskered -- it is hip, handy, and highly literate. This new book could (and should) evict Strunk and White, Turabian, Chicago Style Book, and all the other has-beens and never-weres as the one book every college student (yes, including science majors) should carry in their book bag. (Dissertation-writers may still need Chicago for their fine brush-work, but everyone else will find this jack-of-all-topics addresses most high-school and college needs.)

What's so great about this book? Essentially, it provides one-stop shopping for the essentials of good college term-paper writing -- usually dispensed in travel-sized doses of only three or four pages.

Nuts and Bolts presumes little, but teaches much. It rides no high horses, grinds no axes, curries no favors. Yet it is both idiot- and pedant -proof. Never written an essay before, but want to know what one is? Nuts and Bolts will tell you, without making you feel stupid for having asked. (Enlightening but non-overwhelming flashback to Montaigne included). Want to know what good sentences look like? (hint: active verbs) How to cite a "blog" in an essay? (take that, Strunk and White!) "Nuts and Bolts" does all this and (much) more while always remembering that brevity is the soul of pedagogy.

Finally, though it crisply marches student essays from the first head-scratch to the last push of the "print" button, its elegant writing and efficient layout make Nuts and Bolts ideal for sustained soaks or surgical strikes as needs dictate. Perfect example: Nuts and Bolts provides side-by-side comparisons of how each of the three major citation-systems expect students to format books, articles, websites (etc.) in their bibliographies and footnotes. A veritable god-send for the student triple-majoring in English Lit, Psychology, and Bio!

This book is written so clearly, and presumes so little background on the part of its reader (Professor Harvey has obviously studied the average scantily-trained college student in its native habitat) that you almost don't realize how supremely intelligent it is. Though it will probably mostly be assigned for remedial purposes, the book is so engagingly written it will inspire even very good writers -- teachers and professors included -- to carry it around in their own soft-sider brief cases. Adios, Strunk and White. Hello, Nuts and Bolts.

3 First Rate Guide to Writing
I have taught English at the college level since 1989 and spend a great deal of time treating just the same errors that this text redresses. If you are an English instructor, I would highly encourage you to buy this book and consider adopting it for your classes. If you seek to write better prose, it would behoove you to buy this book, read it, and put its lessons into practice. Michael Harvey writes clearly and does not ask you to do anything stupid. I have never found a book that does that. Believe me, I have looked.