My reading and writing are all about the "ride." Is it fun, surprising, twisty, amusing...? I tend to like to read about and create characters I can admire, yet a nasty scoundrel is always fun. If there's one thing I consistently look for in a book, it's the likeliness of the action; could this actually happen to me? To be able to easily see oneself in the action makes if personal, exciting. Although I write adventure/mysteries, I feel it's important to include humor and allow the reader a break-- even if it's a setup to whack them with a new development. I feel dialogue is enormous. Does it sound the way people would talk to one another? Does it resemble the character uttering it? What is not being said in actual words, but being conveyed in mood and tone?