Publisher Permanently Shelves ‘Opal Mehta’

[survivor999]

By DAVID ZHOU
Crimson Staff Writer

The month-old novel by Harvard undergraduate Kaavya Viswanathan ’08, who has been plagued by plagiarism accusations, will not be re-released, and the sophomore’s two-book deal has been cancelled, her publisher said yesterday in a statement.

“Little, Brown and Company will not be publishing a revised edition of ‘How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild, and Got a Life’ by Kaavya Viswanathan, nor will we publish the second book under contract,” said Little, Brown’s publisher Michael Pietsch ’78.

Viswanathan admitted last week that she borrowed language from two of Megan F. McCafferty’s novels but that any similarities were “unintentional and unconscious.”

The Crimson reported yesterday that “Opal Mehta” also contained similarities to Meg Cabot’s 2000 novel “The Princess Diaries.” The New York Times noted further parallels between Viswanathan’s book and two works by Salman Rushdie and Sophie Kinsella.

Full article: http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=513248

[Fierce]

1. What's sad

is that so many of those books are written like crap anyway. Everyone's looking for the next Oprah book or bestseller, no one edits anymore, and shit like this isn't caught until it's too late.

It's not hard to write crap! Why steal it from someone else?

[democracyindanger]

2. What's amazing

is that the same editor worked on both authors' books.

[Fierce]

3. Ouch.

Perhaps the editor won't be working on any more books?

[survivor999]

4. Good point...

Something is odd, no?