On writing

I finished reading Fables , The Good Prince and like all the fables volumes so far , what an amazing read. After reading the story about the tragic Christmas gift given to the Frog Prince, what a followup. The story has this underlying sorrow running through it, you know things are not going to end well, but there will be a brief period of sunshine and everything about this tale is done correctly , and that includes the ending as well. And it makes me think what makes a story great? Or rather what about a story's telling makes it great? If i look at frog prince lets see , A good guy's family is tragically killed and he embarks on a quest to make it right, his way (and no , fable's is not an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie). Seen this multiple times and in various ways, but fable's rises above all of them. I guess it is the ability of the writer to make us care about the characters. And I think the best guys are able to no matter what character they write. Bill Willingham did it in Fables. Mike Carey is another writer who was able to make the readers care about Lucifer , while not changing the character in any way at all. And Carey is able to do it , no matter what characters he writes. Whether its Frankie in my Faith in Frankie, Or Jen in Re-gifters or Tash in Confessions of a Blabbermouth or Constantine in Hellblazer, when you read the story you care about them (Did I just admit to liking the lead characters in two chic-lits?)
Greg Rucka is another such writer, i can't remember ever bothering about wonder woman , except when Rucka was doing the writing. Same character , same powers, but when Rucka writes you care. Surprisingly If I take a look back at the previous buy on sight Author's (Moore, Gaiman, Miller) they don't share this quality as much. Gaiman and Moore both wrote interesting concepts and idea's which were new/original. Miller was always tough guys being tough, which gets a bit old after a while. I wonder if my reading tastes are changing to preferring character driven stories instead of plot driven?
But anyway this was meant to be about writing. Oh and I would so like to write characters that people would care about , but I think I can't, because I can't invent any, I usually have to base them on people I know (An elf named ... !). At which time it is difficult to change their personality, because that would be in some ways cheating . I think it was Moore who said that you should always write what you would like to read, because that way you are at least guaranteed one satisfied reader. which reminds me I have to complete a story , well not complete, update!