I picked up something new to read this week. Well, something old, actually – in a lull between books I grabbed any old something from my bookshelf and started to read.

The writing wasn’t the best. Well, no, I’ll be honest – the novel simply wasn’t written in the style I prefer. I like subtlety and, for me, this was a bit clunking and obvious.

However, despite that I read it and loved it. I got lost in the book because of the characters.
The writer created a beautiful cast of characters and made me care about them – each was a flawed human being, weighed down by their history and pre-conceptions doing the best they could in the situation they found themselves – which turned out to be the worst possible thing to help them achieve what they wanted.

They became real people in my head, and whatever other faults a book might have, if you can create people I care about, now that’s good writing.

Leave a comment – what can transform a mediocre book for you? Characters – or something else?