Popular Books?

"Popular" reading, I am finding, has nothing to do with writing skill. It is a craft only. There are some who see a certain author's name and buy the book whether the writing is any good or not. They are hooked on the author and don't give a hoot about how it's written other than plot. And that is their choice. Somehow they have eyes that ignore all the faults in the English language simply to get to the end of that title, so to move on to the next in the series. I suspect they have some sort of sifting device in their eyes and minds that forgives the dreadful text they have to wade through to get to the end of each book. There is one particular writer of  thriller novels, that I find so bad, his pages are jokes. His name is not King, incidentally. King writes superbly, even if too many pages. That appears to be the habit of popular authors these days. It makes me wonder if they get paid by the pound.  But the author I speak of, who shall remain anonymous, begins with tripe and goes on and on and on with it. The whole book is filled with murder and not of the characters within, but of the English language and standard writing elements. I am not thinking of  formal, stiff rules but merely those of regarding the respect of usage and the comfort of the reader. One wants a tale to flow evenly to take one on a satisfying journey to a revealing conclusion.  I took a chance once and suggested to this same anonymous writer, some faults I noticed. I knew he might be taken aback, but his irate answer was to ask me, pompously,  how many books  I had published. Margaret Atwood, when I wrote to her saying that I was disappointed in one of her books in her usual looking-down-her-nose style, sent me a lesson in grammar that I put with my other literature information from college days. Readers deserve to be heard by authors. After all, we make them a living, The thriller author of whom I speak, has lately developed the bad habit of including in his verbiage, brand names for which I suspect he gets some kind of kickback.  He also has begun adding allusions from classical literature and small passages I think he gleans from  Bartlett's because he has never struck me as being anywhere near intellectually gifted. His tactic of plugging into sentences and paragraphs, long descriptions and didactics is distracting and maddening. You feel as though you are sitting next to someone chewing gum noisily while you are trying to concentrate. The character might pick up a spoon in the tale, and the author spends two or three sentences enlightening the reader on its metal origins, its style and where it was purchased and by whom. None of the information shoved down one's reading throat matters to the tale. It merely frustrates. He also insists upon far too much verbiage. Half of his pages, if I were his editor, would go. Reading his books is like wading through a sea of melted tar laden with sticks and stones to get across when a simple bridge would do.  I avoided his books for years, but one day while browsing in the library, I came across the shelf that had a row of his shiny new novels. I picked up two thinking that over the years, he must have improved since he is lauded as a "best seller". I did make it through to one third of one book, but no one nearby could abide my loud groans and frequent guffaws, therefore, it's going back to the library's "best seller" shelf today so that I can pick up an author who knows something about writing a best book.