How Kaavya Viswanathan got smacked
Kaavya Viswanathan. A 19 year old Harvard sophomore. a $500,000 chic-lit book deal for How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life". Acres of media coverage. Mountains of hype. One perceptive reader and SPLAT!
Kaavya's book allegedly has 45 passages that bear similarities to Megan Mccafferty's books "sloppy Firsts" and "Second Helpings". Kaavya, first denying any truth to the plagiarism accusations, admitted that she had read both books in high school and may have sub-consciously re-written the words in her book. Read more...
John Scalzi has a good discussion on his blog (Whatever).
I'm annoyed that no one caught this before the book got published (or they thought stupid consumers won't notice). $500k dropped on a book deal just like that, an indication of what the book publishing business is like. I don't really feel sorry for the girl, if she did it, she has to deal with it. Though some say she could have been bullied by the publishing house. Interestingly enough, all this has come out just when Mccafferty's third book, "Charmed Thirds" hit the bookstores.
Hmm, so much we could be suspicious about...
Kaavya's book allegedly has 45 passages that bear similarities to Megan Mccafferty's books "sloppy Firsts" and "Second Helpings". Kaavya, first denying any truth to the plagiarism accusations, admitted that she had read both books in high school and may have sub-consciously re-written the words in her book. Read more...
John Scalzi has a good discussion on his blog (Whatever).
I'm annoyed that no one caught this before the book got published (or they thought stupid consumers won't notice). $500k dropped on a book deal just like that, an indication of what the book publishing business is like. I don't really feel sorry for the girl, if she did it, she has to deal with it. Though some say she could have been bullied by the publishing house. Interestingly enough, all this has come out just when Mccafferty's third book, "Charmed Thirds" hit the bookstores.
Hmm, so much we could be suspicious about...
2 Comments:
it could have been the best thing to happen to her..SHE'S A CELEBRITY NOW!
Hehe, true dat! Wait, which one are you talking about -- Kaavya or Mccafferty?
:)
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