Let's Not Fuck This One Up: How Not To Write A Shitty-Ass Wattpad Story

Overused Plots and Characters

Has anyone else taken a look at the writing on this site? I mean, a good, hard look? On the outside, this shit looks pretty good. Number one ebook community blah blah blah. But then you actually start reading, and...whoa. Not quite what you expected.

Aside from the god-awful lack of quality control in terms of writing, there are really only a few genres that are well-stocked on this site. Occasionally, a story from another genre gets popular, but the vast majority of Wattpad consists of Romance, Teen Fiction, Werewolf, Vampire, and Fanfiction. At least, these are the genres that seem to get the most reads and votes, and are most likely to get featured for you to see on your home page.

Do I have anything against these genres? Absolutely not. I think these stories can be very entertaining if written well with some originality. However, the vast majority of them seem to be the same couple of plots, with varying qualities of writing. In other words...not that impressive. Meanwhile, other genres, such as Historical Fiction, Nonfiction, and Science Fiction, are sadly lacking in the amount of promotions and popularity.

Why do such shit-ass writers become popular, you might ask? Because these stories are simple to write and light reading, not to mention the majority of them are romance novels by a different name. I mean, who doesn't like a little romance? And the plots are easy to copy. Find a plot you like, change the characters' names a bit, and voilà! Your very own Wattpad novel.

The unfortunate thing is Wattpad HQ's consistent promotion of these lackluster writers. The featured stories are ALWAYS from these genres. The What's Hot list? Always these genres. (Which might be due to the readers, but it would be nice to see a little change in the lineup.)

Personally (and you are free to disagree with me) I don't see the need for a Vampire or a Werewolf genre. Seriously! These stories are almost uniformly romance novels with a little dash of paranormal so you can classify them as such. They definitely don't need their own genres. I'm not one of those people who thinks Fanfiction shouldn't be a genre. I have no problem with fanfic; in fact, I enjoy well-written fanfiction. But it is a little sad that it is one of the top genres, rather than original writing.

At least, there could be some originality here, right? I mean, this is Wattpad, for fuck's sake. But it's the same tired old plots and characters, and frankly, I'm quite sick of it.

Take those Bad Boy's Good Girl stories, which should probably be their own genre now that I think about it. The girl is ALWAYS new to the highschool. She ALWAYS has a negative altercation with the school's resident bad boy, a cocky jerk who somehow has a bunch of friends and gets great grades, despite the fact he does no work ever. But she ALWAYS wins him over and makes him fall for her. With the amount of these stories on Wattpad, you could fill a few dumpsters.

I mean, these kinds of stories are fine if you put your own twist on them. But when it's basically the same story as everyone else's...try harder.

Not to mention, the characters in Wattpad's cliché stories are super annoying too, all irritating stock characters. The only thing that changes for the most part are the names. All of these stories usually have at least these 4 characters:

Mary Sue: This character is always REALLY pretty, and there will be an in-depth first-person description of her gorgeousness in the first chapter, usually ending with some lame-ass line, like, "But I'm not that pretty." Bitch, please. When you describe yourself as "5'6, with a soft bronze tan, sparkling sapphire eyes, and long golden hair that goes down to my waist" you're pretty and you know it. She usually has some really long or fancy name that the author likes. Added to the annoying, the author usually feels the need to describe EXACTLY what she is wearing all the fucking time. By the way, this is WAAY more description than is allotted to any other character or thing in the story. The girl never wears makeup (*see The Slut for more on that) because apparently whether or not you wear eyeliner is the be-all-end-all of your worth as a person. Although she gets perfect grades and is really "nerdy", she is a complete idiot about half the time. She is always a virgin. Unless, of course, the author wants some extra angst, in which case the girl will have been raped and abused as a child, probably by her stepdad. (It's always the stepdad.)*Other characters go out of their way to pander to Mary Sue's wants and needs, and almost everyone including the Bad Boy/Billionaire/Alpha/Vampire King-Prince is a foil for making sure the story goes Mary Sue's way.