#i haven't discussed sky fall here because i barely remember the series. just that i didn't like it. so that's a thing

[the-way-astray]

shannon messenger in depth opinion?

she ruined my life . . .

there are both good and bad aspects to her writing. i think she’s particularly horrendous when it comes to telling instead of showing. i'm not a fan of the way she handles many plot and character threads. but her worldbuilding is genuinely amazing. and i have no idea how many times i've said this but i have a post raving about it in my drafts. i think it's been there for the better part of a year. one day it'll come out. one day . . .

i want her to make money, because i know how difficult it is to make it as a publishing author, and even beyond that initial point, it’s hard. i’m going to buy unraveled, and not just because this series has me hooked. i genuinely want her to succeed and become better as an author. i remember reading that a few years ago she was averaging some four hours of sleep a day (which is normal for authors) and the fact that she’d been expected to pump out these brick-size books every year until recently is terrible. her deadlines were keeping her from going to the doctor when she was pregnant (hello???? s&s when i catch you . . . ), and now she has two young kids to take care of on top of her already demanding job. i believe she was also open about the fact that she was struggling to write legacy because of her divorce.

i also respect the fact that she’s not posting her kids’ faces to the internet. too many parents with social media presences nowadays are too comfortable doing that, and it says something that shannon isn't.

i'm not a fan of the way she clearly has not checked some internal biases when writing kotlc (lack of diversity, no canon queer characters, weird sexist remarks, some sexism woven into the fabric of the series), but i do believe she's making an effort to change that (rayni was revealed to be a canon poc (and while i don't like her, that's sort of just a general gripe i have with shannon's writing), the graphic novel removes all of keefe's weird sexist remarks, etc.) and i respect that she's clearly changed in some capacity. i'm not quite sure how far this will extend (unraveled is the true test, i feel), but there's something. and that's worth saying.

she has a voice when writing. when you read it for ten books straight you really start to notice it, and i'm not a fan of it. having said that, i think it's a good thing to have a recognizable style like that. so do with that what you will.

what else. oh. a lot of people claim sophie is like her self-insert because of the blonde hair brown eyes thing. shannon has actually stated that she didn't realize the similarity between herself and sophie visually until a while after creating her, so assuming she's not purposefully lying (which i don't see her doing), she at least didn't consciously design sophie that way. so that's a thing.

and finally, sophie's name was originally supposed to be agnes mcweenie because shannon wanted it to be dorky as shit. that tells you everything you need to know about this woman.