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Originally Posted by holymadness
He is not a very strong manipulator of language.
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I think I can agree with this. He didn't write great literature, but fun stories, IMO.
(I think he said about himself that he continually failed to write "great" text, but at the same time he rarely writes "bad" text.)
However, I think he was great at conveying ideas - which, to me, is one of the main purposes of a book.
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He created no memorable characters in his lifetime.
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Depends on how you define memorable, I guess.
I could name a few, but perhaps mainly because they're the heroes of the stories.
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He has the merit of being a visionary, but not a particularly good writer.
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That doesn't necessarily mean he was a bad writer, I guess?
If comparing writing to food, I'd consider his writing to be oatmeal - it's uniformly bland but you know what you're getting and there aren't any bad surprises.
(Unless of course you can't stand it in the first place. I only once tried it. Yuck.)
Also, it might be worth mentioning that he himself said he never could really escape his growing up with "pulp fiction" magazines.
From what I gather, those were often really bad writing. (Apparently written words on paper not bound as books were new back then. Everything was bought and published.)
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Originally Posted by Desertway
A tiny addition: As to Asimov and major female characters, remember Susan Calvin (I, Robot).
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I think it could be argued that Susan doesn't really count as being a female
(Not in terms of body, but mind. Just as well one might argue that she wasn't really human either.)