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Q&A What weight should be given to writers groups critiques?

I joined a writers group that meets every three weeks. I submitted the first eighteen pages of my work and also sent the same file to a publisher at AuthorHouse. The writers group had varied opin...

3 answers  ·  posted 5y ago by Rasdashan‭  ·  last activity 4y ago by System‭

#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T11:56:28Z (over 4 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/45306
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by user avatar Rasdashan‭ · 2019-12-08T11:56:28Z (over 4 years ago)
I joined a writers group that meets every three weeks. I submitted the first eighteen pages of my work and also sent the same file to a publisher at AuthorHouse.

The writers group had varied opinions including I need more identifiers because the characters sound the same. I don’t think that they do. I was told to simplify my language and reword certain passages. I was told that I use _that_ too often (4300 occurrences in nearly 300k words).

However, my cousin remarked that I used the word unremarkable four times in one paragraph (I asked him if I used that too often).

The gentleman at AuthorHouse told me nothing disturbed his immersion and he wants to read more. He said he always knew who was saying what and to whom and that good writers use minimal identifiers. He also said that writers groups can end up confusing writers as their purpose is to tear it apart looking for mistakes. Not to worry.

How much weight would one give the critique? I know it is feedback and completely optional.

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2019-05-21T15:48:00Z (almost 5 years ago)
Original score: 15