34 WYSIWYG

WYSIWYG is a real writing crime so I was disappointed (and infuriated, admit it) to see it all throughout a book I read by an author I like this week. It’s when you write scenes that are only what is on the surface. There’s no nuance or depth or any layers or anything. No self-reflection, no story arc, no character development.

I might be finding a long way to say bad writing. But I know this person can write extremely good work! So what happened here?

Preaching, a mission other than storytelling, a character they loved so much they couldn’t write her well. No perspective.

The book I read is about a wealthy family in Scotland interacting with some Scottish Travellers and being Good and Right about things having to do with them and not Prejudiced and Bad and Mean. It’s all about as complex as children’s skits. Truly, scene after scene where a bad person is mean and bad, then a good person is good and nice. Like a morality play.

There’s a huge amount of unconsidered privilege that never gets addressed or resolved, even though that would have made a great story. The main character never develops at all. It’s all so weird. And she goes around kissing absolutely everyone, from a brother and sister both, to the guy fixing up her house, to a drag performer, to the violent authority figure threatening her friends. She never grasps anything about anything she does. It’s MADDENING.

So that’s fun. Let’s study how not to write flat, on the nose, what you see is what you get scenes!

Sacred cheese of life!