Essential English for Journalists, Editors and Writers, Harold Evans (Pimlico)

Usage and Abusage, Eric Partridge and Janet Whitcut (Penguin)

Fowler’s Modern English Usage, RW Burchfield (OUP)

The Complete Plain Words, Sir Ernest Gowers (Penguin)

The King’s English, Kingsley Amis (Harper Collins). Short essays and notes on the elegant use of our language by a stylish practitioner who held it in deep respect and used it to brilliant effect.

Oxford Style Manual (OUP)

New Hart’s Rules (OUP). The style book of the OUP, packed with sound advice and good sense. The leading authority for over a century.

New Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors (OUP). The companion volume to Hart’s Rules, an essential reference book for every journalist.

Economist Style Guide (Profile). The house style book of the best written newspaper in English-speaking world. Every journalist should have a copy on the desk.

Waterhouse on Newspaper Style, Keith Waterhouse (Viking). Originally written as the Daily Mirror’s guide to house style, packed with sound advice offered with Waterhouse’s trademark humour. A legend in the profession, before it was published, copies smuggled out of the Mirror newsroom were sold to hacks from other papers on a thriving black market.

Penguin Guide to Plain English (Penguin)

Good Word Guide, Martin H Manser (AC Black)