There seems to be a trend in book publishing this year -- but it’s not a good one. Lying and plagiarizing is the name of the game, and now 19-year-old Kaavya Viswanathan can be considered a player. This week she admitted to "unintentionally" copying author Megan McCafferty’s work for her own novel.
Kaavya went from denying all conections to praising McCafferty’s novels, saying she read them in high school. It is one thing to be inspired and another to just copy.
- McCafferty: "Sabrina was the brainy Angel. Yet another example of how every girl had to be one or the other: Pretty or smart."
- Viswanathan: "Moneypenny was the brainy female character. Yet another example of how every girl had to be one or the other: smart or pretty."
Can’t we think of anything original anymore?
Her publisher has stated that the errors will be corrected in future revisions of the book. As an author, Kaavya should have had enough integrity and knowledge to write something original in the first place. Lucky for her, things didn’t turn out as bad as they did for James Frey. At least she still has her half-a-million, and she’s not even out of Harvard!
Tracy Steel @ Wed, 04/26/2006 - 1:14pm
Kaavya is still the butt of the media's jokes lately, much like Frey. Lesson learned: when you get a million dollar book deal, remove all drunk pictures from your facebook profile.