Mt. Moon Community

Hi and welcome to my "guide".

The purpose of this is to help people with writing; to be referred to with help on things like sentence structure, tone, grammar, etc.

So far, it's pretty small, but I've got a lot of ideas planned out for it. Right now, I plan to do a section on tone, inverted commas, colons and semi-colons, a terminology guide and homophones.
Everything I've done comes from a variety of sources, pulled together by me into a big mega-guide. I got help from a friend on SPPF, wikipedia and my own English class notes.

I hope you find it helpful. Anyways, here's the first topic I've completed: Sentences.

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Types of Sentence

Long and Short Sentences
A piece of writing in which all the sentences are similar in length or follow the same grammatical pattern will be dull and lifeless to read. A good writer should be able to create an appropriate balance between long and short sentences.

By structure

Simple Sentence
consists of a single independent clause with no dependent clause

Compound Sentence
consists of multiple independent clauses with no dependent clauses

Complex Sentence
consists of a single independent clause with at least one dependent clause

Compound-Complex Sentence
consists of multiple independent clauses with on of them having at least one dependent clause


By Purpose

Declarative Sentence
Also called a statement
States a piece of information
"John is sitting down."
Usually used in narrative or factual writing

Interrogative Sentence
Also called a question
Used to request information
"Is John sitting down?"
Usually used in reflective or emotive writing
A rhetorical question is a question to which no answer is really expected; it may have the effect of a strong statement: "What time of night do you call this?"

Exclamatory Sentence
Also called an exclamation
Generally a more emphatic form of statement
"John is sitting down!"
Usually used to convey a tone of amazement, shock or strong emotion

Imperative Sentence
Also called a command
Used to give a command or make a request
"Sit down, John."
Usually used in instructions and in writing aiming to persuade, such as advertisements


A major sentence is a regular sentence, it has a subject and a predicate.
"I have a ball"
"They have a ball"
Subject ~ governs agreement on the verb or auxiliary verb that carries the main tense of the sentence, as exemplified by the difference in verb forms between "I have" and "They have"
Predicate ~ an expression that can be true of something. Thus, the expressions "is yellow" or "like broccoli" are true of those things that are yellow or like broccoli, respectively.

Minor Sentence
where the verb is omitted for dramatic effect - usually, but not always, this is some form of the verb "to be". For example:
"He looked in his rear-view mirror. Nothing coming."
the words "Nothing coming" do make sense, despite missing the verb. This is a more concise way of saying "Nothing was coming".
Minor sentences are used to create impact, suspense, or urgency; to suggest informality; or as abbreviations in notes and diaries.
Examples of minor sentences are ~ headings; stereotyped expressions; emotional expressions; proverbs; etc.

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As stated at the start of the post, this is just the beginning, so don't fret if it doesn't seem like much or is you no use to you right now, there's still more to come (which will be posted once I actually do it XD)

Any ideas for future topics and comments on what I've already done will be welcomed, maybe you could even help improve it (we are a community after all lol).

Oakies, I've just finished compiling the second section of my guide. Hope you all find it useful.

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Pronouns
A noun which stands in place of the name of the person in question
Examples include "he"; "it"; "which"; and "those"
Eg: "Janet thought that he was weird"
The word "he" here is a pronoun

Proper Nouns
Also called proper names
A noun representing unique entities
Examples include "London"; "Universe"; and "John"
Proper nouns are usually capitalized

Common Nouns
A noun representing a class of entities
Examples include "city"; "well"; and "person"

Count Nouns
Combining a plural with a numeral or quantifier ("one", "two", "several", "every", "most") and can take a definite article ("a" or "an")
Examples include "chair"; "nose"; and "occasion"

Mass Nouns
Cannot take plural or combine with number words or quantifiers
Examples include "laughter"; "cutlery"; "helium"; and "furniture"
It is not possible to refer to "a furniture" or "three furnitures"

Collective Nouns
Nouns that refer to groups of more than one individual or entity, even when they are inflected for the singular
Examples include "committee"; "herd"; and "school"
Eg: "the committee talked to each other"

Concrete Nouns
Refer to definite objects which you use at least one of your senses to observe
Examples include "chair"; "apple"; and "Janet"

Abstract Nouns
Refer to ideas or concepts
Examples include "justice"; and "hate"
Some abstract nouns are formed by adding noun-forming suffixes ("-ness"; "-ing"; or "-tion")
Examples include "happiness"; "circulating"; and "serenity"

"Art" can be both a Concrete Noun and an Abstract Noun as it can refer to both a definite object (such as a piece of art, which is physical) and an idea/concept (such as art itself; like the idea of music or science being an "art").

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Wow, I didn't realise there were that many nouns O.O odd...

Anyways, I hope people find this useful. Again, comments are appreciated and, as said in the first post, any ideas for future topics I have not already got on my "to do" list (see first post) are welcome.

Up next is Tone. That should be an interesting one to write

See ya'll again soon!

Oh God (whichever one you want XD) he actually posts!!!!!

03 ~ Tone

In speech, the tone of voice used would make the speaker's feelings clear. In writing, you must look at the word choice to find clues to the feelings or attitudes of the author.

You must consider whether the author is being serious or light-hearted and his/her subjects. If light-hearted, the tome may be humorous in a straight-forward way, where the author is finding his/her subject funny.

A light-hearted tone will often include informal and conversational language, whereas a serious tone is more formal and respectful.
The word conversational itself can also describe a tone, particularly a chatty and/or friendly tone, as if the writer is talking to a friend.
A serious tone is obviously used for serious purposes, on solemn occasions: a funeral speech, for example. Formal, ponderous, or even pompous apply here.

An enthusiastic effusive tone might be used in an advertisement to persuade someone to buy something. An example of this would be a list of gushing superlatives.

Irony is the name given to a figure of speech, where an author says the opposite of what he/she really means. This could be purely for a humorous effect, but there is often a serious purpose behind irony. An author's feelings can be expressed more forcefully for being inverted in this way.
Dramatic irony is when the reader/audience knows what is going to happen to a character before they do.

A flippant tone is where the author is showing an irreverent attitude to something that is normally taken seriously. Irreverence is where a serious matter is taken in a light-hearted way, could also be that the author has a lack of respect for his/her subject or is attacking them satirically.

A tongue-in-cheek tone is a form of irony: the writer will sound serious, but there will be a sense of ridicule behind it. A common feature of this tone is euphemism.

A satirical tone is an extreme form of irony. Here a writer is funny in a more savage way: he/she holds the subject up to ridicule in order to attack it.

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This and Section 02 (Nouns) will be updated at a later date.

Hope this will be useful to anyone who needs it ^.^