Help please--need some objective, BTDT advice

Hey, I'd love to give some advice. I don't know what "BTDT" means, but here goes: Pick one or two comments and work with those. Ignore the rest. A prize winning author will have one reviewer say, "Too simple" and another say, "Too complex." So just pick one or two comments that strike you as insightful. Then put your story aside and read some writers you admire. Then type out a page from a book you admire (seriously).

If you have three readers, you will have five opinions. All of them could be wrong.

BTDT = Been There, Done That

One more: I'd work on the story first, and worry about age and audience later. A story that grabs the reader is what matters.

Different Audience?

Peej said:

(I wrote on a 6th grade level for a first-grade character)

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I like what Teriann said -- just write your story and figure out where it "fits" later. Sounds like you may have already done that. Rather than simplifying the language of your story (which may not be your natural voice), can you change the story to match your 6th-grade level? I wrote a few chapters of a story about a kindergarten kid who runs into trouble with his cousin (etc. etc.), but found after I finished writing it that I needed to translate it up to ~7th grade. Another option is to start with an event in kindergarten (or whatever your initial grade level was supposed to be), then fast forward the story to ~6th grade.

Hope this helps and keep writing!

DaveG

Read as many books from that age-level as you can. This will help you see what other authors are doing in chapter books and what the language is like.

myscribe said:

Read as many books from that age-level as you can. This will help you see what other authors are doing in chapter books and what the language is like.

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That's what I was going to suggest
Really look at the sentences, paragraphs, chapters, as well as the entirety of the book itself. Try to figure out the choices the authors made to reach their intended audience. Also check out some books in the next age level for comparison.