Stange horizons has a great list of standard / tired plot points and devices. It's an interesting read, as it contains a description for just about every story you have ever read, and why the plot devices it employed is old and tired.
This list makes what I see as a meta-point about writing, which is plot doesn't make or break a story. I'm sure a great writer could grab anything off this list and produce great fiction with it, even while using the most tired devices. Execution is how great books are written, written honesty and without authorial sentiment. All books worth reading have a thesis, the author is trying to say something specific. How true the author is to this thesis, honesty being key, determines whether a book is just a nice story or if it has greater worth. This greater worth emerges when the brain of the reader connects with that of the author, and for a short period of time share in an experience that could not arise under different circumstances.
All of the above is rather high minded, and assumes that stories accomplish more than just entertaining the masses. Basically it asserts the assumption that stories have the potential to be art, but that most stories are not. Many people would find these assertions ridiculous or pretentious, to the former: eat me, and to the later, you are right.
