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I don't agree that Martin's writing is far better than Sanderson's. They are on the same level imo. I honestly have no idea how you can say he doesn't produce interesting books, when almost all of his books (except Elantris, which was a snooze) absolutely gripped me. The fact that he's prolific is just icing on the cake. Extremely well written books which also come out once a year? Yes, please!
They are interesting in the way a comic book is interesting. Martin's prose is far better, and Sanderson just has no depth. But I realize that some people don't care about that at all (hence the enormous popularity of fanfiction and litrpgs), and I admit I am pretty judgmental about writing quality. That's why I made the distinction between good and enjoyable; I have read a lot of his books, after all (and enjoyed most of them).
I find this such an alien viewpoint; once writing has reached a (fairly low) bar, I find it to not really matter towards my enjoyment of a book.
The part of the book I have always felt matters is what it says, not how it says it. Caring about the quality of the writing seems like receiving a gift, and discarding it because the wrapping paper was poorly chosen.
I found ASOIAF to be utterly predictable, save for the character deaths (which I suppose is a twist, in its own right). Someone like Feist, Sanderson, or Cook may have flaws in how they write, but the stories themselves are way more interesting to me.
Some people care about wordsmithing and sentence crafting, some people only care about story. There are definitely people who don't understand why anyone would care about the other thing, just as there are people who don't understand why anyone would read fiction.
My theory is that it depends on reading speed. Slower readers (me in foreign languages) care more about sentence crafting because they spend more time with each sentence, whereas in English I am naturally a very fast reader and ‘reading’ a page is a bit like looking through a transparent pane glass.
@Amadan, how much time would you spend on one of Martin’s books, if you don’t mind my asking?
I am a somewhat slower reader usually, but I'm not sure that's the reason. Though I suppose speed reading would make it harder to appreciate individual sentences.
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