I loved that you didn’t engage in the knuckle-rapping and sneering that passes for discussion of the subject. For the novice writer wishing to write genre fiction, fearing cliche and contrivance squashes creativity rather than helping it along.

Most of all I loved your advice: Put together characters for whom this plot makes perfect sense, and your story won’t be contrived, because the characters themselves become the “reason why.” And make your characters unique and interesting, and your story won’t be a cliché, because the characters themselves become the originality in the story.

Good stuff.