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“Gretchen Bernabei takes us beyond the conventional limiting, reductive and frankly boring approach to teaching structure. She asks students to work inductively—to derive possible structures from examining mentor texts, and the more structures the better. Instead of that one format that students are given—you know the five-paragraph theme—she gives us fifty, and doesn’t pretend that this is a complete list. She changes the landscape students can work in from one of a poverty of options to one of wonderful excess. She shows us that as writers we are playing a game with lots of moves.”

– Thomas Newkirk, University of New Hampshire, emeritus