I don’t believe in New Year’s Resolutions anymore. I never want to do the same things at the beginning of the year as I do at the end of the year. At the same time, if I don’t have some kind of goals or plans, I never seem to get anything done.

Enter the New Month’s Resolutions.

This January, I have a few writing related resolutions.

1) Enter a short story for the Shimmer Magazine Pirate’s Edition by January 31st. I just recently learned that the word limit is 5000 words instead of 1500 words. That is going to change my story a ton. I’ll still end up using a lot of what I have written, but I have a whole lot more that I can do before and after that point in the story now.

2) Decide which short story I want to write in February and start jotting down some ideas. I have a few short stories that I want to play with and will have to see which one I flesh out the most during January and if there are any magazines/websites that are looking for something particularly like any of the story ideas that I have.

3) Read a book. I haven’t read very much fiction over the few years and I want to start changing that. I am reading Tad Williams’ Otherland Volume Two: River of Blue Fire. I liked the first book quite a bit, but the second is starting off a bit too much with the “we’ll just keep traveling down the river until something important happens.” Hopefully, something important will eventually happen.

Nothing ground breaking or horribly difficult - hopefully. But, if I get all of that done, I’ll be off to a good start of the year.