James Patterson and the vitality of story

I've seen a lot of chatter on Twitter today about this Times article about James Patterson. Most of the talk is numbers-focused, and there are some startling numbers in the piece — one out of every 17 novels purchased in the US since 2006 was a Patterson book (or a Patterson-and-co-authors book, about which more later). Several staff members at Little, Brown work only on Patterson's books; Little, Brown gave Christmas bonuses this year, based partly on the strength of Patterson's sales. He...