Opposites might attract, but you shouldn’t mix them up. Alas, that’s what occurs all too often with accept and except.

Accept means to receive or believe, as in Residents of New York City accept the fact that often they will meet people who do not fluently speak English.

Except means to exclude, as with Residents of Los Angeles would snarkily say Southern California includes all coastal areas from Malibu south – except for San Diego.

Here’s an easy memory trick for these two words: We accept things with an A grade but exclude them like we would our EX.

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My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past decade, I’ve helped more than 300 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the 7 Minutes a Day… writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.