Writing Tip Wednesday...ahh, Friday

If you don't have a thesaurus buy one. That's my writing tip for this week. Simple and straight to the point. But why does every great writer needs a thesaurus? Did the classic authors have one? I don't know. Should you have one? Yes. It's an absolute must, maybe even before a dictionary.  

According to Marc McCutcheon, you can also use the following words to describe a thesaurus.

 "thesaurus n. lexicon, word treasury, synonym finder, word book"

     I would still call it a thesaurus, but right away you have four other words you could use to describe it if you had too. Just with a slight flick of the wrist. It's that easy.

     I like my thesaurus because I can locate the words I need to use to accurately describe the emotions in my stories. The book is wonderful, great, helpful, useful...and I could find a hundred more words within its paper walls to paint my pictures. 

     My favorite thesaurus is Roget's Super Thesaurus by Marc McCutcheon. I have the first printing edition from 1995. It's torn, the binding is falling apart, and I've put dozens of stickers on the cover. The book is well used, always next to my computer and even went to college with me a long time ago. I was even geeky enough to talk about my adoration of the thesaurus in a speech class. What a nerd. :) 

     When you buy one, then purchase the Roget's Super Thesaurus. It is so well written. Not only does it contain a comprehensive collection of synonyms but it has other, useful, information. It has mini lessons on nouns, such as farm. Not only will he tell you the synonyms; plantation, ranch, grange; but he tells you what the terms are related to farming. Not sure what a horse enclosure is called? It's called a corral. It saves so much time, especially when the mind is drawing a blank and your muse is on her coffee break. 

      There are sample sentences using the words and even quotes from famous people. At the end of the word entry are the antonyms, in case your muse is really enjoying her Double Chocolate Caramel latte with soy milk and you can't think of the word you need but you can think of something that is opposite of that. Trust me, it happens...

     You can purchase this book at amazon.com

      This is a great book and every writer needs a thesaurus at their fingertips. Words are our tools and we should have an easy list of them to access. So thank you Mr. McCutcheon for writing an awesome guide on what writers use most...words.  :)