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For graduate writers, PhD candidates and multilingual scholars

"Your writing needs work." Here is exactly what to fix.

The Academic Writing and Scholarly Style Workbook

Vague feedback like "improve your flow" or "too descriptive" doesn't tell you what to change. This workbook does: 50 exercises and templates that build academic writing from the sentence to the full section, one focused worksheet at a time.

  • A scored self-assessment that tells you which skills to work on first
  • Hedging, signposting and paragraph frameworks you can practise
  • Builders for the introduction, methods, results and discussion

By Dr. Rafiq Muhammad, MD, PhD · 208 pages · Exercises for health, social sciences, education, business and STEM · Paperback $26.99 · ★★★★★ 14 reader reviews

What readers say

Reader reviews

★★★★★ 14 reader reviews from Amazon

Nar
Reviewed April 2026

“As an ESL/EFL instructor, I was very happy to find The Academic Writing and Scholarly Style Workbook. … This is a workbook that I would welcome in my classroom, and it is a resource for those of us who haven’t engaged in much academic writing since graduation.”

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Farkhanda
Reviewed March 2026

“It starts with a writing diagnostic that helps you identify your weak areas, so you can work on them step by step.”

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Dr E
Reviewed March 2026

“I recommend this workbook as a resource when mentoring doctoral students through the dissertation writing process.”

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Maya B.
Reviewed April 2026

“I liked how it focuses on sentence-level clarity first, then builds up to full paragraphs and sections—it makes the whole process feel way more doable.”

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Sasha
Reviewed April 2026

“Great tool to help you with achedemic writing!”

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Heather
Reviewed April 2026

“Provides comprehensive instructions for paragragh building and architecture.”

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Sabrina
Reviewed March 2026

“It really helped to teach me skills that I thought I knew. But I was absolutely clueless.”

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Amazon Customer
Reviewed March 2026

“I absolutely loved using this to help me write papers for my college courses”

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Taylor R.
Reviewed March 2026

“Good learning exercises! Perfect for practice!”

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Emily
Reviewed April 2026

“With each chapter there is also a writing exercise as well as examples of the correct outcome of the exercise.”

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Natalie W.
Reviewed April 2026

“Overall, a highly effective workbook that turns confusing feedback into clear, actionable progress.”

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Mone G.
Reviewed April 2026

“The 50 sentence-level exercises were incredibly helpful for improving clarity and precision in my writing.”

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AvrilsAttic
Reviewed April 2026

“I contend this workbook would be helpful not only in higher education, but beginning in high school AP and first year college as well.”

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Cristal R.
Reviewed April 2026

“What makes this workbook stand out is how actionable it is.”

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Sound familiar?

Feedback that doesn't tell you what to do

“My supervisor says my writing "needs work" but not what to change.”
“I rewrite the same paragraph five times and can't tell if it's better.”
“My literature review describes sources instead of synthesising them.”
“English is my second language, and the small errors keep coming back.”

Academic writing is a set of skills, and skills can be practised. When feedback is translated into a specific target and a specific exercise, improvement stops being guesswork and becomes visible.

How it works

Diagnose. Practise. Write the sections.

From the smallest unit of prose to full manuscript sections.

Step 1

Diagnose

Score yourself across ten writing dimensions and get a practice plan for which chapters to do first.

Step 2

Practise

Sentences, paragraphs and synthesis: hedging, reporting verbs, TEEL and PEAL, the synthesis matrix.

Step 3

Write the sections

A CARS-model introduction, a reproducible methods section, clear results and a strong discussion.

What you will have

What you will be able to do

  • Calibrate certainty with hedging, signposting, reporting verbs and metadiscourse
  • Build paragraphs with the TEEL and PEAL frameworks
  • Turn a descriptive literature review into a critical synthesis
  • Write a CARS-model introduction, and methods, results and discussion sections
  • Fix the 20 most common grammar errors in academic English
  • Decode the 25 most common supervisor comments into specific skill targets
  • Measure progress with before-and-after samples and daily practice banks

Look inside

Every template comes with a worked example

Every exercise shows a worked example first, then gives you the template to practise on your own writing. These are real pages. Tap to enlarge.

Is it for you?

Built for academic writers

It is for you if

  • You are drafting a thesis or dissertation, or a first journal article
  • You write in English as an additional language
  • You teach scholarly writing and need structured exercises

It is not

  • A style guide to read once and shelve
  • An editing service. You do the writing; it shows you how.
  • A replacement for your journal's or programme's own requirements
Dr. Rafiq Muhammad
Dr. Rafiq Muhammad, MD, PhD

Clinician-researcher, PhD from Karolinska Institutet, and author of the Mastering Research books and workbooks, used by graduate students from the research question to the viva.

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Ways to get it

Paperback

$26.99 on Amazon
  • The same 208 pages in print
  • Write in it by hand
  • Shipped by Amazon
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Academic Writing & Scholarly Style Kit

$19 instant download
  • Every fill-in template, as a fillable PDF
  • Type, save and print; US Letter and A4
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Questions

Before you buy

English is my second language. Is this for me?

Yes. It includes targeted correction exercises for the 20 most common grammar errors in academic English, such as articles, tense consistency and nominalisation.

My supervisor's comments are vague. Will it help?

The Feedback Translator decodes the 25 most common supervisor comments into specific skill targets, with the template to practise each one.

Which referencing style does it use?

It includes a photocopiable APA 7th edition quick-reference card.

I only need help with the abstract and title.

Then the Abstract, Title & Keyword Template Kit is the one for you: 45 fillable templates, $19, instant download.

Turn vague feedback into visible improvement

Diagnose the weakness, practise the skill, and write the section.

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