Confusing Words

3 Specialized Skills in Great Ghostwriting

By Lee Barnathan / May 12, 2025
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About a year ago, I wrote about a reason ghostwriting can be expensive: Time is money. Read all about it here. There is another reason, however. Ghostwriting is definitely a specialized skill. Not everybody can do it, Just like critical thinking, public speaking, problem solving, leadership, driving, cooking with charcoal, predicting the weather, and taking…

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4 Critical Book Editing Options

By Lee Barnathan / March 31, 2025
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A recent newsletter I received from Ally Machate, who runs a editing and marketing firm, mentioned three costly mistakes authors make when publishing. The first mistake is rushing to publish without proper editing. “Skipping professional editing might save time (and money in the short term),” she writes, “but it often lead to … negative reviews.”…

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Why a Woman Con Artist is 1 Great Story

By Lee Barnathan / March 24, 2025
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Ninth in an occasional series about compelling stories and ideas worth telling. Have you ever been in a relationship with a con artist? Did you lose a lot of money? Did you try to get him or her back, against your better judgment? Did that con artist try to kill you? Did you survive and…

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Why You Need 1 Capable Book Editor

By Lee Barnathan / February 24, 2025
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Early in my career as a book editor, and edited a manuscript of an expository essay in which the author asserted that the presence and existence of ISIS signaled that Armageddon, as described in the Book of Revelation, is here. I had to do a lot of fact checking, especially making sure the author correctly…

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Why Best Tale of 2 Brothers is Essential

By Lee Barnathan / February 17, 2025
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Eighth in an occasional series about stories and ideas worth telling. Everybody, brothers included, makes choices, and there always are repercussions and consequences of the choices everybody makes. One can choose to live near nature, hear the sounds of birds and insects chirping; enjoy the clean, crisp air, and feel peace—and be susceptible to wild…

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10 Big Bad Word Choices for Speechwriters

By Lee Barnathan / February 10, 2025
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I’m going to begin by stating something incredibly obvious: Words matter in speeches. Trust a speech writer in NYC. Duh, I hear you thinking. Fair enough, let me continue. A speech should be written concisely, meaning the speaker gets up, gets it done quickly, and gets out. That means the speaker (and by extension, the…

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1 Easy AI Choice Clients Should Make

By Lee Barnathan / February 3, 2025
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To AI or not to AI, that is the question. See what I did? I, a human, took something famous written by another human and put a twist on it. I wanted to see if I could get AI to write the same line, so I went to ChatGPT and asked it to “Take Shakespeare’s…

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words have power

Word Tip: Shut or Close?

By Lee Barnathan / June 9, 2022
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Continuing with my desire to help people use the right words so they sound professional, credible, remarkable, and compelling to the people they want to serve, today I discuss whether to use the word shut or close. The idea came from seeing a post on a LinkedIn group I belong to: “I don’t know if this is…

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scrabble tiles with magnifying glass

Word Tip: Lay or Lie?

By Lee Barnathan / June 8, 2022
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I like to say I help my clients use the right words to highlight what makes them remarkable and compelling to the people they want to serve. To do that requires knowing what the right words are. From time to time, I will publish posts that spotlight issues I see people having with word choice,…

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grammar lesson on a whiteboard

Word Tip: Is it One Word, Hyphenated, or Two Words?

By Lee Barnathan / June 7, 2022
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I like to say I help my clients use the right words to highlight what makes them remarkable and compelling to the people they want to serve. To do that requires knowing what the right words are. From time to time, I will publish posts that spotlight issues I see people having with word choice,…

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