Books like The Night Parade

I am a cheap date.I consume an awful lot of cheap fantasy, sci fi, and horror. An author doesn't have to shake my world, bring me flowers, or pay for dinner. I'll take their books to my bed for the price of a mildly engaging plot, a cardboard villain, some stock heroics, and when I reach the unsurprising climax, I'll say "thank you." Literarily, I have round heels.I'm not saying I have no standards, but my standards are appropriate to the context. If you're trying to write high literary fiction, you'd better do so. But most cheap fantasies aren't hiding their intentions. They're not out to change my paradigm. They're just up for a quickie read and not staying for coffee in the morning.So it takes some actual effort to really write badly enough to irk me. "The Night Parade" did. The heroine isn't even cardboard, she's stale cheesecake. Her companions are so wooden enough to serve as furniture. Worst is the "villain." You have the whole panoply of the Forgotten Realms to play with, and couldn't come up with a decent villain? Get out of my house. Don't bother sending flowers.