Birthdays: Bret Harte (1836), Paul H. Buck (1899), Leonard Bernstein (1918), Brian Moore (1921), Thea Astley (1925), Patrick McManus (1933), Charles Wright (1935), Virginia Wolff (1937), Frederick Forsyth (1938), Margaret Maron (1938), Howard Jacobson (1942), Charles Ghigna (1946), Martin Amis (1949),Ian Falconer (1959), Lane Smith (1959), Taslima Nasrin (1962)

Paul H. Buck won the 1938 Pulitzer Prize for History for “The Road to Reunion, 1865-1900”

Charles Wright won both the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize for Poetry.

Charles Ghigna, a children’s book writer, goes by the name “Father Goose”

Quote: “As a novelist nowadays, you have to assume that everything you say will be, for some reader somewhere (and maybe for hundreds of them), something they know a lot about. And they do not forgive slovenly descriptions riddled with errors.” – Frederick Forsyth

Tip: A fragment is a sentence that is missing something, usually the subject, as in: “And do it now.” In this fragment, the subject is implied. But a fragment can also be a single word: “Now!” They can be used to a good effect, but don’t overuse them or they lose their impact.

Jumpstart: You walk into English class in school. Everyone’s staring at you… why? Are you a student? Or a teacher? What’s happening?