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I am trying to make a sentence like this:

As of now, this library has 20 books, most written in English, most books are written by James.

It should state that most books are written in English, but it must not mean that James only wrote most of the books in English, since he wrote most of the books in library. How can I accomplish this in a correct way, but still in one sentence?

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  • As of now, this library has 20 books, most written in English—majority by James.
    – user3214
    Jun 14, 2014 at 11:35
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    @Maxim I might say, "As of now, this library has 20 books, most English, also most by James." Jun 14, 2014 at 11:51

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As of now, this library has 20 books, most written in English, most of those written by James.

However, this can still be ambiguous.

Most of the books in the library are in English. As of now, there are twenty books, most written by James.

This is a bit better. Also, it's definitely a stylistic choice, but I'd use the word twenty rather than the number.

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  • But that fails to exclude the possibility that James' majority of the books in English is a minority of the books in the library - e.g. 12 books are in English and 7 are by James. Jun 14, 2014 at 12:05
  • @StoneyB good point, and I think I may not have read the question as closely as I should have.
    – jimsug
    Jun 14, 2014 at 14:15
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This seems to me to be an unnecessarily periphrastic way of saying

As of now this library has 20 books, of which 17 are in English and 14 of those by Henry James.

(I assume you mean Henry; it needs to be specified, since his brother William was also a celebrated author.)

But if you insist on omitting the numbers, you might write

As of now this library has 20 books, most in English and most indeed by a single author, Henry James.

That is simply a more highfalutin paraphrase of DamkerngT.'s elegant and economical suggestion

As of now, this library has 20 books, most English, also most by James.

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