Every New Writer's Greatest Fear

A new writer friend of mine asked me something every single new writer I've ever met has asked me.
If I let others read my manuscript...how do I keep them from stealing my ideas?
I believe it's a valid fear as a new writer. But perhaps this is because I harbored the exact same alarm.

You've slaved over this story. You think it might be good but you don't know enough to know for certain. After awhile you decide you really don't know what you're doing. Worst of all, you're afraid to let anyone read your work because A. they might confirm your fear and think it sucks or B. it might be so good they'll run off with it.
Well...these were two of my fears when I started. :)

I told my new writer friend a little story to explain why I thought it was unlikely her work would be stolen. She liked it.
Therefore, I'm going to share my limited wisdom here today. :)

What I said:
The thing about stealing ideas is at the forefront of every new writer's thoughts. Including me.
The truth is that is a very rare occurrence.
Here's my theory of why:

Authors have their own voice when they write. Meaning if three different people set out to write a story about an apple falling off a tree, all three writers would come up with a different way to tell the story.

A horror author, like say Stephen King, might have a humongous spider devour it once it hit the ground and no doubt the story would be scary.

A mystery writer might have the apple fall off the tree and go missing whereby a detective might be sent in to solve the mystery of the missing apple.

A romance author such as myself might tell the romantic tale of a hero plucking the apple out of the air before it hit the ground to give to his lady love before they lived happily ever after. (Given that I also write racy romances...something else might occur under the tree before they went off to live happily ever after, but I digress.) :)

In all three stories...the apple would still fall off the tree, but each author would put their own spin on it.

I believe this is also true of writers sharing the same genre. I have lots of romance writer friends...but I don't tell stories the same way they do. Word choice and sentence structure are only a couple of ways we differentiate from each other.

If you're a writer, do you agree?
Do you as least like my Apple/Tree story? :):)
L

PLUS:
As a bonus blog entry today...
I stole this from Sela Carsen.
She has the best stuff on her blog. :):)
L

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