Great, its Ruined!

[Cooper]

Have you ever had one of those moments when planning/writing a novel that when you stumble on a book in the genre your writing in and has the exact, or somewhat, same information and/or concept(s) your writing about, without ever realizing it existed at all?

It happened to me and I wanted to strangle somebody.  I was moving through the fantasy section of my hometowns bookstore, finding something for some inspiration and ideas for my novel, when I found E.E. Knight's Way of the Wolf.  The cover was good, but the summary really made me pissed.  The same concept and the same evil alien race was the same thing as my reason (don't ask) and conclusion for my story.

Good thing it didn't have my top secret race of special humans.  I didn't buy the book.  So now I have to think up a whole new conclusion, evil alien race, and many more information to fill in.  Besides that, I am new to novel writing and I have a thought that you guys can help me with.  Should I keep my conclusion and idea as it is or re-think it if its similar to something else?

[Kali]

Good thing it didn't have my top secret race of special humans.

Um... it sorta does. The Cats are more secret than the Wolves, but the whole training thing they go through is secret. And they're not normal humans, they've been augmented.  Semi-mystically, but it really falls under science so advanced it's indistinguishable from magic more than anything.

[Mickey Finn]

May I introduce you to Identity and  Final Destination?

My version of both stories were more cerebral (FD= not kids, and ends with Death and a chess game, ID= very similiar setup, different villian, but same freakin' idea), but it was close enough to scrap mine.

The Idenity one may get written, much later.

[seradhe]

That is the bane of my writing existence.

... and that's all I have to say on the subject

[blgarver]

Gaiman's Neverwhere almost nixed my WIP. 

But the more I read, I realized they had similar elements and similar situations.  The context is completely different.

Both have a girl from another world closely connected to our own that runs across a normal guy with a ho-hum life and pulls him into her flight from the bad ass superagents from the other world.

I am still a little discouraged about completing mine, but I'm over 300 pages into it and I can't stop now.

[Yeratel]

All the best plots get stolen and recycled over and over again. Don't sweat it, unless your particular treatment is close enough to smell like plagiarism.

[Cooper]

I just don't want to get sued on my first publication.

[blgarver]

All the best plots get stolen and recycled over and over again. Don't sweat it, unless your particular treatment is close enough to smell like plagiarism.

Yeah, my context is a lot different than Gaiman's.  It's just the broad plot that's similar.  It kind of bugs me, but oh well.

[JamiSings]

I basically got accused of plagerizing a short story I put up on FictionPress told from the POV of Beauty's sisters from Beauty & The Beast. Plagerizing a writer I never heard of and a story I never read.

I just shrugged it off though. Lots of people think the same way.

[Matrix Refugee (formerly Morraeon)]

I'm minded of something Neil Gaiman said about originality; I can't remember the exact words, but it was something to the effect of 'don't sweat it if you find a story or an idea that's similar to the one you're working on; the fact that you are writing it and bringing your own unique voice to the telling makes it original.'

[blgarver]

I'm minded of something Neil Gaiman said about originality; I can't remember the exact words, but it was something to the effect of 'don't sweat it if you find a story or an idea that's similar to the one you're working on; the fact that you are writing it and bringing your own unique voice to the telling makes it original.'

Yeah.  I figured it can't be all bad if I'm writing similar to Gaiman.  So what if people who read this book think "hey, this guy reminds me of Gaiman".  I don't see anything bad about that.

[Fade]

Have you ever had one of those moments when planning/writing a novel that when you stumble on a book in the genre your writing in and has the exact, or somewhat, same information and/or concept(s) your writing about, without ever realizing it existed at all?

It happened to me and I wanted to strangle somebody.  I was moving through the fantasy section of my hometowns bookstore, finding something for some inspiration and ideas for my novel, when I found E.E. Knight's Way of the Wolf.  The cover was good, but the summary really made me pissed.  The same concept and the same evil alien race was the same thing as my reason (don't ask) and conclusion for my story.

Good thing it didn't have my top secret race of special humans.  I didn't buy the book.  So now I have to think up a whole new conclusion, evil alien race, and many more information to fill in.  Besides that, I am new to novel writing and I have a thought that you guys can help me with.  Should I keep my conclusion and idea as it is or re-think it if its similar to something else?

its a good book and theirs like 8 for that series out.

[Matrix Refugee (formerly Morraeon)]

Yeah.  I figured it can't be all bad if I'm writing similar to Gaiman.  So what if people who read this book think "hey, this guy reminds me of Gaiman".  I don't see anything bad about that.

Hee, you'd have a ready-made market that way.

[SunPhoenix]

Hm... I wish the was a way to know plots without personally telling the outline for your various ideas. I know I have this one short story idea that seems like it would somewhat be very generic but it also is rather taboo (by that it's something that people won't really touch but is known.) Hehe Idea! Website for authors that include keywords of books and summarizes out line keywords. Now if only someone would actually take the time to do it...

[trboturtle]

Speaking as someone who reads a lit of Military sci-fi, There's only so many different ways you can have an insteller war -- it's the details that different the story, as well as the skill of the writer writing it. Afteer all, my one original project involves a new wizard and his dragon famillar. Alan Dean Foster and Pip and Flix, Steven Brust has Vlad Talos and his pair of Jihergs. All I have to do is put my unique spin on it.....

Craig