What do women want (from an author)?

In Self-Help, Lorrie Moore's first short story collection, she seems to know that plot is not her strong suit.  In the story "How to Become a Writer," the narrator's high school teacher comments, "you have no sense of plot."  (p. 119.)  In her college creative writing seminar, the narrator's teacher comments, "You have, however, a ludicrous notion of plot."  (p. 121.)  Later, her classmates urge her to "think about what is happening.  Where is the story here?"  (p. 123.)  

For my own part, I wish she would've taken their advice.  I read for plot, and I don't buy that "character is plot."  Character is character and plot is plot, and the two are no more interchangeable than a spark plug and a carburator.  Still, I accept authors as I find them:  if Self-Help is any example, Lorrie Moore isn't an author you read for plot.

And I wonder if this characteristic, too - like her lack of ideas - is part of the explanation of her popularity with readers, particularly women readers.  Plot = action = men, just as much as ideas = intellect = men (which is to say, those are false equations from my perspective, but mine may be the minority).  Could it be - this many years after universal education, feminism and Madeline Albright - that NO plot + NO ideas = massive popularity with women?