This begs the question of is this just a natural evolution, or is it the corrupting influence of American TV, films and literature that we should fight with every step? I think diversity of culture is something that we should protect, even the ‘dint’ vs ‘dent’ difference between Victoria and South Australia makes me smile, so I must confess I’m resisting this take-over of our language.

Evolution in language, as with any living thing, should take a very long time. It is something that people are not aware of, such as the generations of people saying ‘towards’ until that the majority don’t realise that (originally) there was only ‘toward’ and over the years the ‘s’ has been added.  

This cannot be said about our American English. I think even those of us who say ‘route’ rhyming with ‘lout’ instead of ‘toot’ know we have crossed over that cultural boundary. This is a change we are seeing occur in a single generation.

I have also noticed recently, with some confusion, that even when I buy Australian published versions of American authors (in my effort to support the local book industry) they will include American spelling –which makes me wonder why I shouldn’t just buy it off Amazon?

The really tragic thing is, I think most of the American spellings that are slipping into our newspapers and emails come down to one thing; most people don’t know how to permanently re-set their Microsoft Word language to Australian English, so we let our computers do our spelling in whatever language they chose, which is the default: American English. It doesn’t need to stay that way.

To get around this I formulated the 100 page rule; to try and read up to at least page 100 (unless it is absolutely awful and I can’t get past page 2) and if I find I don’t care what happens next, or the characters leave me cold, then I give myself permission to put it down and move onto something else.

This rule has served me faithfully over many years, giving me the freedom to cast aside stories that don’t grab me, and helping me along to those that eventually do.

Until now.

I picked up ‘Love in the time of cholera’ by Gabriel Garcia Marquez last week and keenly started reading it. It has been on my ‘books to read’ list for more years than I care to mention. Being set in a different culture and written in a very different style to many modern books, I quickly found myself lost in the world of spice and sweat and noisy parrots.

Like so many books I have enjoyed in the past, page 100 came and went without my notice, and I was powering through it. But then something strange happened. I got to around page 200 and realised there really wasn’t any story. It was about, exactly as the title would suggest, love… in the time of cholera. That’s it.

Seeing another world with wonderful descriptions is all well and good, but without a story, and with a lead character who gets more selfish and perverse with each page, I found myself creating excuses not to pick it up! With less than 100 pages to go, I did not want to give up on it, but I had no desire to find out what happened next either. I was confused.

So I did something I have never done before. I forced myself to read to the end, speed reading at times and disliking it greatly by the time I got to the last page. My page 100 rule failed me badly.

Which makes me wonder, when it comes to reading maybe all rules should go out the window? If you don’t like it anymore, put it down. I think that might be my new mantra.

But what is an original story? I don’t think it is a theme or story arc, I think it is all the facets that are brought together to make the characters breathe and the world feel really tangible.

I find it can often be the difference in the development of a character that can make one story bland when I read it, but sing to you when you discover it. If we laugh or cry, or throw the book across the room or simply keep falling asleep, it is the meat of the story, not its bones, that catch our hearts (or not).

To illustrate my point have a look at the number of different versions there are of many popular fairytales; Cinderalla, Red Riding Hood, The Three Bears.  Some are fantastic while some are horribly boring, even though they are telling the same tale. Deeper than that, some are terrifyingly dark, others laugh out loud funny, and more importantly some are great for sending little kids off to the land of nod, while others would have them so shocked they would not be able to sleep for a week! 

So don’t knock yourself out too much on looking for the original story, many would have you believe the search if fruitless Focus instead on the original delivery, find some wonderful characters, put them in beautiful well-painted worlds and find the right language to tell your story. That is where you get to really play with your craft.

Before I feed any paranoid ideas around this by giving you some tips about how to protect your legally binding copyright, let me first explain why a publisher, or at least a reputable publisher, will not steal your writing.

The writing community is generally pretty tight-knit, even if they don’t physically get together and catch up (which most do, and I highly recommend) they are always connected through email, Twitter and blogs. So if any publisher were to ‘steal’ an idea or piece of work, everyone would know about it, and pretty quickly too! So do a search on your prospective publisher and see what people are saying about them online. Places like duotope and ralan also provide a commentary on what a publisher is like, so use these resources.

For major publishers I would suggest you do not even need to do such a search. There is nothing a publisher would like more than to discover the next fantastic author. A publishing house is also not looking for a great story, they are looking for an author with longevity who can provide them with many stories. So if they see merit in your work they are more likely to sign you for a three book deal than try to lift your idea.

But if this still isn’t enough to convince you, this is five years of your hard work after all, how can you protect your copyright? One of the most basic ways is to save it to a disk or flash drive, seal it in a letter (a line of continuous sticky tape across the top, but under the stamp is a good seal) and post it to yourself. The post-mark of the postal system is a legally provable date. A more modern way (which I am not sure if it has been used in court but would probably have a lot of weight) is to email the attachment to yourself, which will clearly display the date*.

I know there are a lot of places that charge you money to register your copyright, but the fact is that the moment you write your piece you are covered by copyright. All you need to do to protect that copyright is to prove you wrote it first. You don’t need to spend lots of money to register it.

One word of warning for the paranoid before they project their claims of injustice; just because the place you sent your novel to releases one with a similar theme soon after they reject yours does not mean they stole your idea. Often similar themes come through at the same time, so don’t assume they stole your idea. You probably tapped into the collective unconscious and wrote a similar story, after all, there is no such thing as an original idea.

*Please seek legal advice on this matter if you wish to use it. I do not have any legal qualifications and as such cannot give legal advice.

So far the least number of words I have written in a day is 124, the most; 1,493. All up this week I have managed over 3,000 words. All this just by trying to make 100 words a day. I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t tried it myself (and had the spreadsheet to track and graph it, of course).

Three days I needed to do my 100 words after climbing into bed for the end of the day. I was so determined to reach this tiny little goal that I easily motivated myself to leave the light on just ten minutes longer. Once I even had to write on the back of an envelope because I couldn’t find my pad and the enthusiasm was severely lacking to go looking for it, but at no time did I think it was too much to attempt.

100 words per day is so unbelievably doable! And more than 75% of what I have written was usable stuff. I even dusted off an old novel and managed to plough through, past my dreaded chapter 5.

If I can do this for a month I might even form the habit of a lifetime. No matter how busy life gets or how many other deadlines I have, I think I should always be able to make these 100 words; three or four paragraphs, fifteen lines on my little bedside pad. I might just get some of these novels finished yet…

The New Year is already a week old, and most of my resolutions have taken a bit of a battering. But I was prepared for that and am happy to renew them all afresh each week if needed.

Many members of my writers group are publically declaring their writing goals, so I figure I should join in. There are two popular choices at the moment, a 500 word a day challenge and a 100 word a day challenge. Last week I thought I’d go for a soft 1,000 word a week challenge, but quickly discovered my brain had translated that to ‘only sit down on Sunday and write 1,000 words.’

So I’m joining the 100 word a day challenge. The appeal of this is that even in my grumpiest, most uninspired moments I can always force out 100 words, I can’t say the same about 500 words. And if I really am going to do this thing EVERY DAY then sometimes I’ll need the safety net of just pushing out the bare minimum.

The other thing is that once I start writing I rarely stop at 100 words. So I expect that if I manage to get into the write frame of mind (ha ha, what a clever, original pun eh?) then I should be able to push out about 700-1,000 words in one sitting.

I like that there is a responsibility to sit down every day with the daily goal. It is too easy to put off until tomorrow what you really should do today when you have a weekly target. Also, if I have a good day where I do write 700 words, I won’t be able to automatically give myself the rest of the week off. I’ll have to get a pocket notebook to keep in my bag for those days I can’t get to a computer. And I’ll be good this year and not count blog words.

Okay, let the challenge begin!

Before I went to sleep, but after I crawled into bed (midnight is not so easy to reach as I get older) I wrote down my list of ten things in 2011 for which I was grateful, and then ten things I would like to achieve in 2012. The achievement hopefuls will set my monthly and weekly goal sheets for the rest of the year.

As a goal-setting, list-writing addict the beginning of the year is like another Christmas. I’ve updated all my Excel writing plans and word count target files (and let’s not forget the associated graphs), and I’ve run all the statistics on the closed out 2011 files with all my final data (of which there was very little post-July).

While it does smack a little of procrastination, I cannot help but wonder if my change in tact midway through last year from opening my goal sheet the moment I sat down to write, to just sitting down to write might have been a mistake. Seeing what I had committed to each time I sat down reminded me of the big picture, and where I wanted to be.

This year I’m going to do better than just opening it up, I’m going to print it out and put it on the wall, so everyone who comes in here can also see what I’ve committed to. Also when it is printed out I’ll be less tempted to spend time fiddling with it.

Anyway, my word count sheet for the year is looking sadly bare today, so I’d better get back to that novel and add another five hundred words to earn myself an Escape to the Country tonight!

Happy New Year, and Happy Writing!

Word count this week; 1,500+

But not too merry

Be safe and appreciate the ones you love.

Word count this week 1,000+ words! Yay!

Naturally, as I’m sure we all do when faced by the realism of our own mortality, I thought of what I would be leaving behind. The song of a hundred unfinished stories filled my head and I realised that I really am wasting too much time. I know I have finished and published some stories, but next to the ones that are partly written, I can promise the best is yet to come!

I know last week I talked of well wasted time, but the truth is, much of my time recently has been wasted in front of the television, and much of that television was reality TV (house buying, house renovating or racing around the world). I can’t help but think these reality TV shows are just a poor substitute for doing it yourself? And if I’m honest with myself, I have collected enough material on these subjects now to satisfy me for life.

It’s time to do.

I think it will be harder than my chocolate-free months, but I want to give up all reality TV between now and New Year; documentaries, news, renovation anything, all gone. If it didn’t employ a writer of fiction to create it, I am not watching it. I know that sounds like I’m not cutting my options by much, but there are only a couple of fictional programs I like, so most of my evenings will end up being TV free.

If I want to leave behind more than a dent in the lounge then I need to start getting up off it and sitting at the desk instead. And I will also be turning off the internet, there is more reality TV on the net to trip you up than there has ever been on TV.

No more excuses, my writing starts again now!

But every now and then you get a reminder that not all frivolous actions are wasted time.

I have been lucky enough to be much closer to my family in the last 12 months after over 16 years of living out of the state (and sometimes the country). My writing has certainly suffered over the last year, but my relationship with my family is stronger than ever.

You can’t just order that up and get it delivered. It takes time. And sometimes that time feels like it is being wasted. Long chats over the dinner table and sitting watching a favourite TV show with those you love can be very rewarding, even if they leave you with no words in the novel bank. They are also moments you will cherish when you no longer have the opportunity to slip into them at will.

Remember, everything is material when you are a writer. The way I see it is that I’ve just spent a lot of time on research this year. And I’m very at peace with that.

Word count this week: zero.