I never liked fran either, in fact for most of the book reading about her was annoying and tedious for me, that only changed towards the end but I still didn't like her.
As for molly, I've said it before on here I'm sure, I think the criticism of her is too harsh, ok she wasn't great but (in my opinion) the only person who was great in it was Gary Sinise playing stu and possibly the guy who played lloyd hendreid. Kathy bates was as good as you'd expect from a fantastic actor such as her but her part was so small you could hardly count it. For me, the actors who played Flagg, Harold, trashy, kojak's owner (whose name I can't remember) and many others in the mini series were as bad as or worse than molly ringwald.