Any time you pour your heart and soul into something, you become vulnerable to criticism. Writing is no different. As an author, I want my readers to fall in love with the story as much as I have; but that's like asking everybody to like you. It's an impossibility. So, I let the positive reviews feed my soul, and the negative ones build my character.
I think it is unethical to steal another person's ideas. There are bound to be similarities among stories, characters, etc... those things happen by chance. But adopting another person's creative vision and passing it off as your own is wrong.
It's cliche, but I'll say it anyway: NEVER give up. I used to have this misconception that in order to write, I had to be "qualified" to write. I believed that to be taken seriously as an author, I needed to have advanced degrees and fancy awards to my name. Then one day I woke up and realized that writing is as simple as dreaming up an idea and putting pen to paper. Those are the only qualifications you need.
