@Jase, while I agree with you that writing a blind character who is just defined by their blindness is an example of a poorly written character, just as the example of a helpless damsel is a poorly written female character, I'm afraid I don't agree that its so difficult to define what the difference between "badly written" and "well written" is, or that we shouldn't point out such examples when they occur, one reason I enjoy writing book reviews myself.
One great acid test for a good character employed by internet reviewer plinkit is to see how much you can say about a character without mentioning their appearance or profession, EG describe the character's personality and motivation, rather than just their essential plot function, or indeed transcends stereotypical beliefs about whatever specific minority the person belongs to.
Look at princess Leia from the original starwars film. Though basically for most of the plot she remains pretty much a damsel in distress and at least partly a motivating force for Luke and Han's actions, there is so more to her than that, she's tough, cynical and also quite a diplomat when needed. Indeed, when I see original starwars now I'm rather amazed just at how much work into fleshing out the characters, giving them multiple motivations and different sides to their personalities even in such relatively uncomplicated science fantasy.
This btw is also why I dislike super heros so much myself.
Oh, and I'd be interested to know which characters in Dresden you thought were particularly thin. I read them a few years ago, and while I enjoyed the books to some extent, I did think they had some pretty glarring holes, though I don't remember them in enough detail to say specifically who and where.
@sirbadger, I had a very similar experience in egypt myself, particularly I was surprised how much people took note of my academic achievements, which was actually a little uncomfortable.
Interestingly enough, a lot of enlightenment thinking around blindness was based on the idea that blind people could not see the light of god and so were morally inferior, Leonado Devinci had quite the treatise on the subject. There was also the attitude that since blind people could not reason correctly, they had to achieve "good grace" through hard, repetitive work, hence the movement for asylums for the blind etc.
Btw, one of my phd markers, was a professor who has done a lot of work on the history of the concept of blindness, and his book was quite fascinating on the subject, especially corilating past attitudes, with some sadly persistent present ones.
With our dreaming and singing, Ceaseless and sorrowless we! The glory about us clinging Of the glorious futures we see,
Our souls with high music ringing; O men! It must ever be
That we dwell in our dreaming and singing, A little apart from ye. (Arthur O'Shaughnessy 1873.)