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• Style: Toward Clarity and Grace, Joseph M. Williams.
  The single most influential book on my writing. Most guides to writing speak in maxims and platitudes - "Be succinct" or "Write clearly". Williams accomplishes a unique feat in actually demonstrating techniques that allow writers to write succinctly and clearly. Unlike most writing guides, this book cannot be consumed in a single sitting. It requires the reader to work at the techniques, not simply to read Williams' ideas and magically hope that they will appear in the reader's future written works. If you spend the time with it, you will not be disappointed. I highly recommend the first 4-6 chapters, the returns diminish as the chapters go on. I have also summarized the important points of the first few chapters.

• The Craft of Research, Wayne C. Booth, et al.
  If there's one book to read about research and writing, I think this might be it. After reading through the book once, I plan to reference individual chapters throughout my research process, especially Parts III and IV (in fact, I have already done so). Although some of the chapters and passages are really better suited to high school or undergraduate students, overall I feel there is something for every level of researcher in this work. My only complaint is that the authors are English and Philosophy professors who don't seem to consider experimental results as data, which is what scientists use to support their claims (as opposed to English, History, and Philosophy where sources are the norm for evidence).

  Chapter break down:

  1. Thinking in Print: The Uses of Research, Public and Private. Worthwhile, but not essential.
  2. Connecting with Your Reader: (Re)Creating Your Self and Your Audience. Worthwhile, but not essential.
  3. From Topics to Questions. Good for undergrads or early grads in search of a topic.
  4. From Questions to Problems. Great.
  5. From Problems to Sources. How to find sources. Not really useful for literature searches in the sciences, pp. 88-89 enough. Good for high school or undergraduates.
  6. Using Sources. How to read and cite sources, pp. 100-107 most useful as well as the speed reading tip at the end. Good for high school or undergraduates.
  7. Making Good Arguments: An Overview. Excellent.
  8. Claims. Excellent. Also useful for writing abstracts.
  9. Reasons and Evidence. Not bad, sections 9.3 and 9.5 (pp. 142-148) are particularly good.
  10. Acknowledgments and Responses. Good, best to read once paper is written.
  11. Warrants. Ok.
  12. Planning and Drafting. Very good. Essential for researchers with little paper writing experience.
  13. Revising Your Organization and Argument. Good advice for revising from the reader's perspective, although the chapter explains how to identify mistakes but not how to fix them!
  14. Introductions and Conclusions. Great, best after first or second draft.
  15. Communicating Evidence Visually. Good, practical advice, although I don't think it should replace the useful first four chapters of Miller's work.
  16. Revising Style: Telling Your Story Clearly. Excellent revision advice.

• The Chicago Guide to Writing About Numbers, Jane E. Miller
  I feel Part I: Principles (chapters 2-4) is worth reading, though I wouldn't recommend the whole book. Personally, I feel the later chapters are repetitive of the first few and could be inferred by the astute reader (or the more than novice paper writer). Exceptions to this rule are noted by recommended pages in the chapter break down below.

  Chapter break down:

  1. Why Write about Numbers? A skippable intro.
  2. Seven Basic Principles. Great.
  3. Causality, Statistical Significance, and Substantive Significance. Great.
  4. Technical but Important: Five More Basic Principles. Useful.
  5. Types of Quantitative Comparison. Not bad.
  6. Creating Effective Tables. Unless you've never written a paper, skip; pp. 102-103, 117-127 recommended.
  7. Creating Effective Charts. Not bad, pp. 150-166 recommended.
  8. Choosing Effective Examples and Analogies. Not bad.
  9. Writing about Distributions and Associations. Unless you've never written a paper, skip.
  10. Writing about Data and Methods. Read the boxes and summary.
  11. Writing Introductions, Results, and Conclusions. Read if you're having trouble explaining your data and results.
  12. Speaking about Numbers. Better than not reading anything at all on presentations, pp. 256-264 recommended.
  13. Appendix A: Implementing "Generalization, Example, Exceptions" (GEE). If you thought the GEE concept presented in Chapter 2 could be useful, then read this short appendix.

  If nothing else, peruse the nice end of chapter summaries to find what sections of the book most suit your needs. Because the work is geared to such a general audience, I feel that other writing guides may serve scientists better. In fact, I felt some of the guidance of the writing chapters in Part III actually conflicted with my own experiences in writing papers and giving presentations.

  A study guide is available to practice the techniques presented.

• The Chicago Guide to Communicating Science, Scott L. Montgomery
  I felt the main contribution of this book was how to read papers well to improve your own writing. Despite the title, I felt the major points could apply to any field. Overall I felt the work is skippable if you've read Booth, except for Chapter 3: Reading Well, which I found invaluable.

  Chapter break down:

  1. Communicating Science. Skippable. Motivates scientific communication.
  2. Scientific Communication: Historical Realities for Readers and Writers. Skippable. How scientific communication has changed over time.
  3. Reading Well: The First Step to Writing Well. Excellent, especially pp. 34-5. How to read well to improve your own writing.
  4. Writing Well: A Few Basics. Ok. Decent tips for revising.
  5. Writing Very Well: Opportunities for Creativity and Elegance. Ok. The functional writer may skip this chapter.
  6. The Review Process: Contents and Discontents. Good if you've never experienced the paper review process or have trouble dealing with reviewer's comments.
  7. The Scientific Paper: A Realistic View and Practical Advice. Good, practical.
  8. Other Types of Writing: Review Articles, Book Reviews, Debate/Critique. Skippable, except for learning to write diplomatically, pp. 109-112.
  9. Graphics and Their Place. Good, nice scientific examples (as compared to Booth or Miller).
  10. Technical Reports.
  11. The Proposal.
  12. For Researchers with English as a Foreign Language.
  13. Oral Presentations: A Few Words.
  14. The Online World: Using the Internet. Not bad.
  15. Dealing with the Press.
  16. In Conclusion.

• Graphic Discovery, Howard Wainer
  

• How to Lie With Statistics, Darrell Huff
  

• The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, Edward R. Tufte