It gave me a headache from the start, and it only got worse.

I’ve seen a lot of posts from people who love Scrivener. They can’t seem to be able to talk highly enough of it. To me it sounded like a one shoe fits all kind of praise. You’re not going to go wrong. You’ll love it. It does exactly what it says on the tin.

So I tried it for myself. And that was where the enjoyment stopped.

If you have ever had trouble with your car and if you have ever decided to take it upon yourself to look under the hood, you might just understand where I’m coming from and what I’m about to say.

The first thing that struck me was the complexity of it all.  The screen is awash with a myriad of buttons and side panels and options. I sat there for what seemed like an age wondering, what the hell does that do? What’s that for? Should I push this? Oh, and if I do this, then, surely, this should happen.

If only it was that simple.

And yet it was supposed to be designed to make like ... simpler.

Alas, Scrivener is not for me. I don’t need that many options under the hood to get the job done. I have my notes beside me – or firmly in my head – so if things go belly-up I know I won’t lose them straight off the bat.

Oh, sure, Scrivener has an inbuilt option to convert your text to publishable formats, but as far as I’m concerned, that’s about as good as it gets.

I don’t need it complicated to get things done.

I sit down, I grind out my words, and I get the job done. Simple.

I like the idea behind Scrivener, I honestly do, but I often think there they over thought the whole application before they made it. It was almost like they’re saying, here, have this, you need it.

No. No I don’t.

Thanks anyway.