Worse, the author's own personality is less removed and we may feel more talked at and less involved, not as immersed as we should be in a dream-like series of events. I have no time for these and believe that there is probably more artifice in being plot-less than in overdoing the plot control. I think it was Rosamund Pilcher who likened stories to a clothes line. She didn't say it, but maybe her theme is the clothes line. The thread and the sense of the controlling purpose of the story is what steers her characters with whispers.
Plotters decide for their characters.
Plotters imagine they know their characters and they design the character's path, make the character's problems and solutions up for him. We have come to expect the unexpected and we produce clich and artifice to which the character has to adhere. Great writers can cover this up. Most of us cannot. Theme and character-driven writers don't decide for their characters.