SEPTEMBER 2022 - AudioFile
Ellen Jovin’s attractive middle-register voice with its hint of a scratchy burr is as enthusiastic and welcoming as you’d expect from someone who chats about words and punctuation with anyone who’s interested. The author of three previous books on language, Jovin took her passion on the road by creating a pop-up grammar advice table, which she used as she and her husband traveled the country. Humorous anecdotes and syntactical conundrums fill the enjoyable result, which she reads with animation, clarity, and good pacing. If you notice my use of the Oxford comma, then this book will satisfy yearnings not easily confided to others. Those who like anecdotes of people’s quirks, such as an Alabama businessman’s struggle with “affect” and “effect,” also will be charmed. A.C.S. © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine
Publishers Weekly
05/02/2022
Jovin (English at Work), cofounder of a communication training firm, documents in this zippy account her trip across America with a pop-up grammar advice table. In 2018, she set up shop in Manhattan’s Verdi Square answering “grammar questions from passersby.” Her endeavor was a success, and soon she took the show on the road across 47 states. Whether she’s discussing Oxford commas (“a national obsession, but... surely not a global one”) or contractions (evading them can sound robotic), Jovin uses a combination of intuition and established guidelines to demonstrate that there’s almost always more than one correct answer to questions of communication. Along the way, she shares funny anecdotes about the interactions at her booth and how it functioned as an outlet for individuals to passionately express their points of view: “The semicolon inspires an array of emotional and intellectual responses: curiosity, anxiety, indifference, affection, and disdain,” for example. Jovin’s emphasis is always on fun—chapters have silly titles (“Semicolonphobia!” and “Whom Ya Gonna Call?”), and stick-figure drawings illustrate the concepts. The result reads less like a how-to guide and more like a usage-centered memoir. Fellow language lovers will enjoy the ride. Agent: Victoria Skurnick, Levine Greenberg Rostan. (July)
From the Publisher
Jovin uses a combination of intuition and established guidelines to demonstrate that there’s almost always more than one correct answer to questions of communication. Along the way, she shares funny anecdotes about the interactions at her booth and how it functioned as an outlet for individuals to passionately express their points of view…Fellow language lovers will enjoy the ride.” — Publishers Weekly
"A delightful, educative journey through some prickly regions of English grammar...Jovin positions herself, convincingly, as not just a linguistic, but an emotional counselor, fostering healthy communication rather than judgement...The invitation she poses in her introduction—'Now, please lie down on a nice couch with this book and let’s have some grammar therapy'—is well worth accepting." — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"Ellen Jovin is, literally, a public grammarian, doling out advice on myriad fine points of language from behind a folding table she first set up in Manhattan's Verdi Park. In Rebel with a Clause, Jovin shares not only her story as an itinerant language maven but so much first-rate wisdom about everything from the effective wielding of commas to differentiating between 'effect' and 'affect' (to say nothing of 'who' and 'whom') that you may not realize till you finish the book that you've learned so much. And she does it with sweetness and an enviable generosity of spirit. She never hectors, never finger-points; she enlightens and illuminates. This is lovely work." — Benjamin Dreyer, author of the New York Times bestseller Dreyer's English
"In Rebel with a Clause, Ellen Jovin has given us a street-level view of English grammar and usage, engaging with kids, drunks, cranks, and dads all over this land. From Verdi Square to Venice Beach, Fargo to New Orleans, she brings organization and clarity to every subject she lights on, presiding over the Grammar Table with tact, humility, and irrepressible playfulness. A fresh and democratic take on language by a gifted teacher." — Mary Norris, author of Between You and Me: Confessions of a Comma Queen and Greek to Me
"This is perhaps the most imaginative book ever written about grammar—essentially a series of autobiographical short stories in which the recurring character, Ellen Jovin, plays the educational, charming, and ever-patient protagonist. If you can't stop by her grammar table, stop and buy her book at your favorite bookshop." — Bryan A. Garner, author of Garner's Modern English Usage
"Of all things a jolly grammar book! Curl up and finally take in those niceties of grammar that you always feel like you haven't paid quite enough attention to. Jovin has the gift of making grammar feel like charcuterie instead of medicine—and along the way you also get invaluable randomnesses such as that there are people in Ohio who pronounce 'vigil' as 'vid-ju-al'!" — John McWhorter
"Those who learn grammatical rules are doomed to repeat them. And, boy, do they repeat them—tirelessly, senselessly, bringing us to the point where much of the English-speaking world thinks grammar is boring or difficult or scary. Ellen Jovin is on a mission to rescue us from that joyless fate. Her generosity and curiosity about language is second only to her generosity and curiosity with the people who approach her for grammatical advice. We could all stand to be a bit more Ellen Jovin." — Lynne Murphy, Professor of Linguistics, University of Sussex, and author of The Prodigal Tongue
Benjamin Dreyer
"Ellen Jovin is, literally, a public grammarian, doling out advice on myriad fine points of language from behind a folding table she first set up in Manhattan's Verdi Park. In Rebel with a Clause, Jovin shares not only her story as an itinerant language maven but so much first-rate wisdom about everything from the effective wielding of commas to differentiating between 'effect' and 'affect' (to say nothing of 'who' and 'whom') that you may not realize till you finish the book that you've learned so much. And she does it with sweetness and an enviable generosity of spirit. She never hectors, never finger-points; she enlightens and illuminates. This is lovely work."
Mary Norris
"In Rebel with a Clause, Ellen Jovin has given us a street-level view of English grammar and usage, engaging with kids, drunks, cranks, and dads all over this land. From Verdi Square to Venice Beach, Fargo to New Orleans, she brings organization and clarity to every subject she lights on, presiding over the Grammar Table with tact, humility, and irrepressible playfulness. A fresh and democratic take on language by a gifted teacher."
Bryan A. Garner
"This is perhaps the most imaginative book ever written about grammar—essentially a series of autobiographical short stories in which the recurring character, Ellen Jovin, plays the educational, charming, and ever-patient protagonist. If you can't stop by her grammar table, stop and buy her book at your favorite bookshop."
John McWhorter
"Of all things a jolly grammar book! Curl up and finally take in those niceties of grammar that you always feel like you haven't paid quite enough attention to. Jovin has the gift of making grammar feel like charcuterie instead of medicine—and along the way you also get invaluable randomnesses such as that there are people in Ohio who pronounce 'vigil' as 'vid-ju-al'!"
Kirkus Reviews
★ 2022-05-17
A grammar expert takes on vexing questions and pet peeves.
Jovin, the author of several books on writing and grammar, describes her experiences traveling across the country answering the public’s questions about language use. In 49 lively chapters, she recounts her conversations on punctuation, conjugation, spelling, pronunciation, and contentious word choices while offering sage and sensible advice on common areas of confusion. She writes about passersby who air their grievances about the misuse of apostrophes, and she offers jaunty but exceptionally clear illustrations of their appropriate deployment. Individual chapters cover some familiar problem areas—affect and effect, lie and lay, whoever and whomever—along with broader reflections on the evolution of verbal conventions in the digital age and the significance of a respect for language itself. The conversations that unfold on her tour are, she rightly observes, “filled with humor and feeling for the complex linguistic glue that binds us together as human beings and distinguishes us from other living creatures.” Jovin’s charm as an explainer of sometimes-esoteric rules and as a defender of common sense and clarity in communication is a major strength of this book. Another is her lighthearted but incisive commentary on people’s emotional investments in grammar. A large part of the book’s comedy comes from her descriptions of how disagreements about proper expression can pit people against one another, poisoning otherwise successful relationships. Many of the chapters describe people venting about others’ grammatical lapses, and Jovin positions herself, convincingly, as not just a linguistic, but an emotional counselor, fostering healthy communication rather than judgement. The invitation she poses in her introduction—“Now, please lie down on a nice couch with this book and let’s have some grammar therapy”—is well worth accepting.
A delightful, educative journey through some prickly regions of English grammar.