Need to brush up on your proofreading skills? Here’s a list of books that will help you catch errors before they embarrass you or your company. These books were recently recommended by members of the Stet Professional Copy Editors LinkedIn group, and I have included their comments on each title.

• New Hart’s Rules: The Handbook of Style for Writers and Editors. “Covers English style from A to Z.”
• “I really enjoyed Copyediting and Proofreading for Dummies. It had a lot of good advice about running a business, as well as copyediting and proofreading.”
• “Hands down, it’s Words Into Type …It’s not nearly as tome-like and cumbersome as the Chicago Manual and covers much more than the AP Style Guide. This book makes it extremely easy to find what you need in the index, is comprehensive and covers myriad situations that come up when proofreading and copy editing. It was invaluable during my years as a proofreader at Citi, and I highly recommend it.”
• “Mark My Words: Instruction and Practice in Proofreading by Peggy Smith covers the subject specifically.”
• “The Pocket Book of Proofreading by William Critchley and Don’t Trust Your Spell Check: Pro Proofreading Tactics And Tests To Eliminate Embarrassing Writing Errors (Good Content Creation) by Dean Evans. Both a light, fun reads, but with some great advice.”
• “For actually running a proofreading business: Marketing Your Editing & Proofreading Business: Being interesting and discoverable by Louise Harnby”
• “I recommend The McGraw-Hill Desk Reference for Editors, Writers, and Proofreaders. It’s conversational, filled with useful tips and checklists (it includes the 8-stage Proofreading Checklist), and a CD ROM that includes style sheet templates, editorial checklist, and much more.”
• “There is also The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation for quick checks.”
• “I like Bill Walsh’s books (the two I have are Lapsing into a Comma and The Elephants of Style). Enjoyable reads as well as being useful tools of the trade.”
• “The Forest for the Trees is also a great resource.”

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Do you have a book to suggest? List it in the comments, below. Thanks!