I bought this book due to the glowing reviews of the other reviewers, and was very disappointed. The book was sloppily edited. I wasn't looking for errors, but kept finding them - picky stuff like typos, contradictions, and word for word repetition. A writing book shouldn't contain these types of errors.Nearly half of the book was long-winded bios of SF authors which were sometimes interesting, but mostly not - and suggested nothing to improve writing. There were a few good tidbits, but they were few and far between.Do not buy. Get Damon Kight's book instead - Creating Short Fiction. Much more practical and interesting.