Feature and Follow Fridays: Good Writing VS Good Plot/Characters

Question of the Week: How important is good writing to you? In an ideal world, a book would be beautifully written AND have great character development, plot, etc. But in the real world, which do you prefer: (1) Great characters and plot with lousy writing or (2) Middling character development and plot but gorgeous writing

It's gotta be number one for me. Of course there is a point where the writing becomes too distracting if it's really bad, but I've always been more focused on characters, plots and the world of the book than the prose itself (in fact I prefer simpler prose to anything that might be considered beatiful).

This probably stems from the fact that when I write myself, those are the places I know the best and are my strengths. I am terrible at grammar (I was once both the queen of run on sentences and fragments, much to my teachers' dismays) so I never feel comfortable critiquing stuff like that.

And of course when it all comes down to it, why would I read a book in the first place if the characters are non-connectable and the plot doesn't interest me or make sense?