Join Amazon Prime and ship Two-Day for free and Overnight for $3.99. Already a member? Sign in.
Eats, Shoots and Leaves and over 140,000 other books are available for Amazon Kindle – Amazon’s new wireless reading device. Learn more

 

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
 
   
More Buying Choices
165 used & new from $2.36

Have one to sell? Sell yours here
 
   
Tell a Friend
Eats, Shoots  &  Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation
 
 
Start reading Eats, Shoots & Leaves on your Kindle in under a minute.

Don’t have a Kindle? Get yours here.
 
  

Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation (Paperback)

by Lynne Truss (Author) "Either this will ring bells for you, or it won't..." (more)
Key Phrases: punctuation system, Aldus Manutius, Opal Fruits, Lord Fellamar (more...)
3.9 out of 5 stars  (534 customer reviews)

List Price: $12.00
Price: $9.60 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details
You Save: $2.40 (20%)
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com. Gift-wrap available.

Want it delivered Friday, July 25? Choose One-Day Shipping at checkout. See details

165 used & new available from $2.36
Also Available in: List Price: Our Price: Other Offers:
Kindle Edition (Kindle Book) $8.80
Hardcover (Bargain Price) 27 used & new from $3.75
Hardcover (1) $19.95 $13.57 410 used & new from $0.01
Paperback (Import) 5 used & new from $20.67
Audio CD (Audiobook,Unabridged) $14.95 $10.17 57 used & new from $0.35
Hardcover (Large Print) 12 used & new from $2.99
 
   

Special Offers and Product Promotions

Best Value

Buy Semantic Antics: How and Why Words Change Meaning and get Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation at an additional 5% off Amazon.com's everyday low price.

Semantic Antics: How and Why Words Change Meaning Eats, Shoots  &  Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation Buy Together Today: $19.29


Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought

Eats, Shoots  &  Leaves: Why, Commas Really Do Make a Difference!

Eats, Shoots & Leaves: Why, Commas Really Do Make a Difference! by Lynne Truss

4.4 out of 5 stars (38) 
Talk to the Hand: The Utter Bloody Rudeness of the World Today, or Six Good Reasons to Stay Home and Bolt the Door

Talk to the Hand: The Utter Bloody Rudeness of the World Today, or Six Good Reasons to Stay Home and Bolt the Door by Lynne Truss

2.8 out of 5 stars (118)  $4.99
Woe Is I: The Grammarphobe's Guide to Better English in Plain English, Second Edition

Woe Is I: The Grammarphobe's Guide to Better English in Plain English, Second Edition by Patricia T. O'Conner

4.4 out of 5 stars (115)  $11.20
The Girl's Like Spaghetti: Why, You Can't Manage without Apostrophes!

The Girl's Like Spaghetti: Why, You Can't Manage without Apostrophes! by Lynne Truss

4.4 out of 5 stars (8) 
Oxymoronica: Paradoxical Wit & Wisdom From History's Greatest Wordsmiths

Oxymoronica: Paradoxical Wit & Wisdom From History's Greatest Wordsmiths by Mardy Grothe

4.4 out of 5 stars (29)  $10.17
Explore similar items : Books (97)

Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Who would have thought a book about punctuation could cause such a sensation? Certainly not its modest if indignant author, who began her surprise hit motivated by "horror" and "despair" at the current state of British usage: ungrammatical signs ("BOB,S PETS"), headlines ("DEAD SONS PHOTOS MAY BE RELEASED") and band names ("Hear'Say") drove journalist and novelist Truss absolutely batty. But this spirited and wittily instructional little volume, which was a U.K. #1 bestseller, is not a grammar book, Truss insists; like a self-help volume, it "gives you permission to love punctuation." Her approach falls between the descriptive and prescriptive schools of grammar study, but is closer, perhaps, to the latter. (A self-professed "stickler," Truss recommends that anyone putting an apostrophe in a possessive "its"-as in "the dog chewed it's bone"-should be struck by lightning and chopped to bits.) Employing a chatty tone that ranges from pleasant rant to gentle lecture to bemused dismay, Truss dissects common errors that grammar mavens have long deplored (often, as she readily points out, in isolation) and makes elegant arguments for increased attention to punctuation correctness: "without it there is no reliable way of communicating meaning." Interspersing her lessons with bits of history (the apostrophe dates from the 16th century; the first semicolon appeared in 1494) and plenty of wit, Truss serves up delightful, unabashedly strict and sometimes snobby little book, with cheery Britishisms ("Lawks-a-mussy!") dotting pages that express a more international righteous indignation.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From AudioFile
Oh, to be in England. Or rather, oh, to have quotidian access to BBC4 radio productions such as "Cutting a Dash," the hit series about punctuation that inspired the hit book EATS, SHOOTS & LEAVES. Thank goodness all six episodes are available as a classy audio production. Swinging jazz riffs introduce each segment; background noises color scenes set on city streets and in children's classrooms; and through it all, the crisp, humor-filled voice of comedy writer/literary editor Lynne Truss gives us permission to laugh aloud while being shocked, yes shocked, about the disastrous state of punctuation and grammar in the modern world. Notice my use of the semicolon, a punctuation mark that Truss has caused me to reconsider. I have learned that Greek dramatists gave the world the comma,