The Way We Word: Musings on the Meaning of Everyday English

Janet Arnett is the former campus manager of adult education at Ontario’s Georgian College. She is the author of Antiques and Collectibles: Starting Small, The Grange at Knock, and 673 Ways to Save Money.

Inconsistent quality is the dominant characteristic of this collection
of columns from The Globe and Mail.

Cochrane strives to entertain as well as inform. His tone is light and
he reaches for humor in whatever form he can find it: puns, conjecture,
quotations, and idiosyncrasies. At his best, he is hilarious; more often
that not, he’s a shade short of funny. Occasionally, he simply tries
too hard, stretching to find interesting material where none exists.

Repetition is also a weakness. While a small amount of repetition is
acceptable in a weekly column, when those columns are reprinted in book
form, repeatedly encountering the same information is an irritant.

Cochrane’s field—words—is wide enough to offer considerable
diversity. Misuses, origins, meanings, specialized vocabularies,
important influences on words, and landmarks in the world of words are
all good for a column or two. In this collection, there’s one on words
made popular by Sir Walter Scott, one on terms associated with Easter,
one on words people use to answer the telephone. Some are packed with
detail and information; others are rather thin on content.

Taken in small doses, this book will interest writers, editors, grammar
teachers, and anyone intrigued by the English language.