"Greatest, Dumbest, Weirdest...Whatever" Question

For July, I'm participating in the "Gearin' Up to Get an Agent Blogfest" hosted by Deana Barnhart. This is Week 1. So, here are my instructions:

Take the greatest, dumbest, weirdest...just whatever kind of writing question you have, and post it on your blog Wednesday.

So.

How do you know when/if

all the stuff you're being told about writing

(the 'show, don't tell', avoid adverbs, watch out for 'was' and

all other forms of the word, be careful of info dumping, etc.)

are flaws, and when they are good writing?

I ask because i really want to learn to do this right. This month I've been taking some time off to enjoy some leisure reading after spending weeks working on my WIP to get it ready for my critique group. I've been amazed--after editing and editing the above items in my question--about how much these popular writers do all that stuff. Hence my question.

I'm interested in what everyone has to say on this.

ETA: Roni Loren's post today entitled Death by Critique touches on some of this. You ought to check it out.

Book Reviews - Should You or Shouldn't You?

There's been an interesting discussion going on among members of a writing group I recently joined about whether or not we should review books. It was an interesting discussion.

Then today author Roni Loren talked about it on her blog. You can find today's post here. I think she raised some very good points and reached some of the same conclusions I have.

What about you? Do you review books and tell it all, even if you hated it?