“The craft of the sentence is important. But a perfectly crafted sentence with no passion is a well-dressed corpse. More fun to dance with a beggar than kiss a corpse”

I think this whenever I hear about people who complain that the ‘popular’ novel wasn’t really that good because it didn’t do this or that. It didn’t tick this box or underline that particular technique. But obviously it did something, because the public latched on to it and wouldn’t let go. And yes, I guess you could say that the public is mindless and many of them follow the latest trend just because it’s the latest trend, but there always has to be a leader to start it off, a mind who was engaged by that passion.
So which is more important – the well crafted sentence or the passion? I think they are equally important. It’s clear that passion will win many, but some will only be won over by technique. If you’re trying for as diverse an audience as possible, I think you need to be proficient at both, but rest assured, you’ll never please everybody. Someone will always have an axe to grind.