Yes I know ideally both are well developed, but what hooks you in more, characters or premise/plot driven stories? Usually I'm much more likely to finish a book with a story I don't like but people I care about than one with a fascinating plot and people i couldn't care less about.

Not to say I don't occasionally a very plot focused something or another that's handled well enough that flat characters don't stop me from wanting to see how it all ties together, but that's very much the exception and not the rule.

You will find this a lame answer, but it depends on the piece.

I have been known to forgive iffy character development for a killer plot just as often as I've stuck with a piece because the character(s) was/were so fascinating that I didn't care about the plot.

When both elements are in synch, though? Magic.

Examples to come.

99% of the time it's character. ENDER'S GAME is my favorite novel because of how well Ender Wiggin is written.

The 1%? Isaac Asimov. He focused much more on plot, but I love his stuff.

No, that's not lame at all, Frank. I'm very much the same way in many instances. Like I said, some times a story can be good enough for me to forgive wooden characters, but i just noticed for me when one is significantly less than the other in something I'm reading, I'm more likely to forgive the flaws of the one with good characters.

Errr, it …. It ….

Adult diapers.



I very much love The Catcher in the Rye, but you know what? The plot is all but nonexistent.

On the other hand, I’m a huge Arthur C. Clarke fan, and you know what? His characters tend to be petty flat.

By and large I’d say I’m more attracted to plot than character (and yet my writing is the exact opposite – go figure). I like the suspense of wanting to know what will happen next, and enjoy exploring new worlds. I can often deal with flat characters if you’re showing me extraordinary things.

But there are always exceptions, of course. The aforementioned Catcher is ALL character. Lovecraft stories are more about mood than plot. The little King I’ve read has been most impressive from a character perspective; his plots are “eh” to me. And so on.

Depends!

good characters can get me through some silly, nonexistant, or laborious plots.

Which is why I like sequels so much. I like following characters.

I've never read a character interesting enough to get me through a dull plot. Interesting characters are generally interesting because the plot is interesting.

Good characters can't save a good plot, but a good plot can save bad characters.

I value characters more than I once did. But I still insist on an interesting plot if I'm going to read it.

This is a very good thread.

I like the idea of both being strong, as the best writers tend to be capable of doing anything breathtakingly well. That said, plot in fine literature is reflective of a certain authorial reality that, since Don Quixote, perhaps even since Apuleius' 'The Golden Ass', depends heavily on playfully experimenting with a mundane reality that we suggest exists only in the presence of children. It's all made up, because life is totally unpredictable, totally unknowable, however much it might seem to be following a pattern. Again, the best writers, not enslaved by 'the demands of the genre' (hiya JB!), concentrate less upon this aspect, because they concentrate more (in my view) upon....

Character! The formation of realistic, sympathetic character is THE challenge to a writer, because how do you convincingly write someone who isn't you? How do you constuct their patterns of speech and modes of intended/actual movement within the streams of what you want to happen? How do you convey to the reader who has never met this type, this archetype, this stereotype, this anti-type, just what the hell they are and still make that reader care for, perhaps love this character? Hey, I'm fucked if I know, but Dostoevsky can do it, Gogol can do it, Garcia Marquez can do it, Muriel Spark can do it. Name your own.

So, character wins by a length, rather than a league.

How much do I love Dan?