We all know the basics of punctuation. Or do we? A look at most neighborhood signage tells a different story. Through sloppy usage and low standards on the internet, in email, and now text messages, we have made proper punctuation an endangered species. In Eats, Shoots & Leaves, former editor Lynne Truss dares to say, in her delightfully urbane, witty, and very English way, that it is time to look at our commas and semicolons and see them as...

"1957: In the beach town of Brighton, music is playing and guests are sunning themselves, when a young man is found dead, dripping blood, in a deck chair. Constable Twitten of the Brighton Police Force has a hunch that the fiendish murder may be connected to a notorious nightspot, but his captain and his colleagues are-as ever-busy with other more important issues. Inspector Steine is being conned into paying for the honor of being featured at the...

"It's September in Brighton and the city is playing host to weeks of endless rain and lashings of villainy. A trusted member of a local gang has disappeared part way through planning a huge heist; a violent criminal obsessed with boiling the heads of policemen has escaped Broadmoor and is rumoured to be headed towards the city, while at Gosling's department store an American researcher has been found dead in the music section. Inspector Steine has...

Lynne Truss's first novel, in which she shows herself to be one of the very best comic writers. 'It was nobody's fault, this widely held assumption that 'Come Into the Garden' had long since sought eternal peace in the great magazine rack in the sky. Nevertheless, it required strength of character for those intimately acquainted with the title not to take the comments personally. After all, it was a bit like being dead but not lying down'. Osborne...

The story of one woman's foray into the very masculine and rather baffling world of sport. Lynne Truss spent four years as an unlikely sports writer for The Times. It was a job that took her around the world (via the most difficult journeys and least glamorous hotels) and introduced her to some of the greatest living sportsmen (and many argumentative men with clipboards). During her time at the newspaper she faced disdain from fellow sports writers;...

An American expatriate living in London explores the historical and cultural differences between American and British versions of English, covering snacking habits, overall collective personalities, dating and sex, drinking and raising kids. --Publisher's description.