Spelling, grammar (when it's not intentional as part of dialog), and other mechanical aspects of writing? Yeah, that can be construed as constructive criticism. But when you start nitpicking stylistic choices and the plot it's self, that is likely getting into the realms of personal preference. And demanding every single author cator to your personal preferences is not only silly, it's arrogant. If
@mp3.1415player was constantly shifting from first person to third person, past tense to present tense to future tense with no rhyme or reason... Yeah, that would be something to complain about. In fact, that's something I've seen far too often over at fanfiction dot net. "I can't tell who's speaking" however is quite possibly more of a personal taste issue. Especially if others are capable of telling who's speaking at any given moment.
Except they don't? They all use the same syntax and lexicon and all sound exactly the same.
They all seem the same
to you. Others, myself included, can easily tell each character's speech apart. They
do have different patterns of speech. It can be subtle. But then again, it's not like text can easily convey tone of voice, accent, and other personally identifying aspects of a person's speech. For characters who rarely appear, it may seem similar or the same. Then again, how many people actually have wildly different word choices and sentence structures when talking with each other?
Yes, some people will have verbal ticks. I tend to use the phrase "you know" a lot more often then seems reasonable when talking to others. I'll say "catch ya later" instead of "catch you later" as well. But if you transcribed a conversation between me and some of my friends and family, we'd all have similar sentence structures and verbiage used.
