...and I am quite behind on the blogging I wanted to do. I've been in Maryland for almost two weeks to buy a house! Maybe. We found one we liked but tomorrow is the inspection, where ALL OUR DREAMS COULD SHATTER. Although buying a house is pretty scary, so in the dead of night sometimes I want my dreams to shatter. Except, like all proper dreams, one must proceed forward. Kind of like writing. A LOT like a writing career, actually. Tense waiting for phone calls. Elation followed by awareness of sudden responsibility...
It's a big, beautiful, Victorian house. The kind of house I always imagined ALL writers must live in when I was a kid. But I come from Florida where nearly all houses are new (and according to a recent article in Huffington Post, 58% or something are behind on their mortgages, whee!) so it has taken some getting used to being up here where almost all houses are old!
Anyway, while I was up here I signed copies of Between the Sea and Sky at the Barnes and Noble in Bel Air, MD. If you're looking for one. They only had three, I don't know how long they'll last.
Between the Sea and Sky has also been getting great reviews, and I am so happy that some readers really seem to be enjoying it. My publisher has set up a ton of blog interviews with me, so if you want to know more about it, you'll be able to find me just about everywhere in the next couple of weeks. Thanks to all reviewers, interviewers, and readers for your support!
Although if someone wants to be nice and give it a 5 star review on Amazon, I will give you a virtual hug. Right now it's almost all 4-star, which is a great review, but aww, the 5-star category looks so lonely... *pathetic moment*
Sunday, October 30, 2011
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Launch Party in Orlando (not mine)
My friend Jessica Martinez, author of Virtuosity, is having her launch party this Tuesday! This book has been getting great buzz! It'll be at the Waterford Lakes Barnes & Noble at 6:30. It should be fun!
Also, I got Magic Under Stone ARCs. A TON of them. I've already spent hundreds of dollars mailing out Between the Sea and Sky ARCs, so I stared at these with a mixture of excitement and...horror. So, I will be toting them around everywhere I go. Well, at least everywhere book-related I go. I'll have a few at this launch party. Come say hi to me and buy Jessica's wonderful book, and I'll give you a Magic Under Stone ARC. (Quantities limited, because I don't expect anyone to really show up. I think maybe three central Floridians look at my blog every week...)
Stay tuned to this space for my Between the Sea and Sky prequel comic strips! Yessss.
Also, I got Magic Under Stone ARCs. A TON of them. I've already spent hundreds of dollars mailing out Between the Sea and Sky ARCs, so I stared at these with a mixture of excitement and...horror. So, I will be toting them around everywhere I go. Well, at least everywhere book-related I go. I'll have a few at this launch party. Come say hi to me and buy Jessica's wonderful book, and I'll give you a Magic Under Stone ARC. (Quantities limited, because I don't expect anyone to really show up. I think maybe three central Floridians look at my blog every week...)
Stay tuned to this space for my Between the Sea and Sky prequel comic strips! Yessss.
Monday, October 10, 2011
Ancestors
My grandfather is dying. His mother is turning 100 next month. Only in the last couple of years, her memory started to go and was put in a nursing home. I was thinking about all of this last night, and how when someone lives to be 100 and their mind slips away, it's not the same kind of mourning.
I was talking to my dad about how I've been watching that Prohibition documentary on PBS, and while I watch, I feel like I can see my great-grandmother in the old footage. She would have been a teenager during the 20s. It occurred to me that because of her, the 1920s feels like as far back in time as I can really get a hold of. The 30s, 40s, and 50s, too, I wasn't alive of course, but I can imagine what they must have been like because I can close my eyes and see myself as a little kid at a family clambake, with all the old people around, I can hear their Ohio accents, and the sound of my grandfather playing the organ. I can see the decor in their houses, the bowl of soft mints, the offered bowl of cheap pretzels. I can imagine the joking around. And the alcohol. It might have been the 1980s, it might have been Florida instead of Ohio, but I think those dim memories probably had the same atmosphere as what I see in old pictures.
I remember it, but it's gone now. Gatherings aren't the same. They don't happen as often, and when they do, the mood isn't the same. The old people of my childhood have gone, and now my grandparents, who were not really that old when I was born, are now the old people. I was never that close to my dad's parents or my great-grandmother, really, not enough to have a ton of personal memories of them, but I do feel really sad for the whole atmosphere of their lives passing on.
When you're a kid you take it for granted, you have no sense of history. You don't ask questions, so you only get family stories if someone volunteers them. I think I'll always wish I knew more about my relatives, as they go. But a part of me still knows a time and place I never lived through, because it swirled around me when I was just a little girl.
But, I miss it.
I was talking to my dad about how I've been watching that Prohibition documentary on PBS, and while I watch, I feel like I can see my great-grandmother in the old footage. She would have been a teenager during the 20s. It occurred to me that because of her, the 1920s feels like as far back in time as I can really get a hold of. The 30s, 40s, and 50s, too, I wasn't alive of course, but I can imagine what they must have been like because I can close my eyes and see myself as a little kid at a family clambake, with all the old people around, I can hear their Ohio accents, and the sound of my grandfather playing the organ. I can see the decor in their houses, the bowl of soft mints, the offered bowl of cheap pretzels. I can imagine the joking around. And the alcohol. It might have been the 1980s, it might have been Florida instead of Ohio, but I think those dim memories probably had the same atmosphere as what I see in old pictures.
I remember it, but it's gone now. Gatherings aren't the same. They don't happen as often, and when they do, the mood isn't the same. The old people of my childhood have gone, and now my grandparents, who were not really that old when I was born, are now the old people. I was never that close to my dad's parents or my great-grandmother, really, not enough to have a ton of personal memories of them, but I do feel really sad for the whole atmosphere of their lives passing on.
When you're a kid you take it for granted, you have no sense of history. You don't ask questions, so you only get family stories if someone volunteers them. I think I'll always wish I knew more about my relatives, as they go. But a part of me still knows a time and place I never lived through, because it swirled around me when I was just a little girl.
But, I miss it.
Sunday, October 9, 2011
The worst hot dog ever
There are some authors who always have hilariously awkward stories about their lives. I love stories like that! But I rarely have them because I rarely go anywhere.
Well, last weekend I went with my sister to an indie craft fair where she was selling her art. This craft fair had one food vendor (besides people selling the ubiquitous hipster food of the moment, cupcakes) and it was a hot dog cart. Being trapped at a table for about 8 hours as we were, we got hungry and needed food from said hot dog cart. There was always a huge line, but eventually we got so hungry I was willing to brave it.
I got down the stairs and forged through crowds of people to the cart only to be told it was closed for their lunch break and would reopen in 20 minutes. About 40 minutes later (we could see it out of a window behind us) it actually opened. People lined up. They'd been waiting for hot dogs. I watched the line, focusing on a man in a red shirt near the back for visual reference. 20 minutes later, THAT MAN HAD NOT MOVED.
What were these hot dogs, I wondered? Were they grinding the meat themselves? But we were SO HUNGRY. I got in line. I was about the 10th person and after a bit I calculated that it was taking them 5 minutes for each individual hot dog.
I still don't understand. Did they have one teeny tiny cooking apparatus that could only make one hot dog at once?
I waited 40+ minutes to near the front of the line. I was almost there when they said they were out of buns and were going to shut down.
"Can I just get a hot dog without the bun?" I cried, in anguish. If you've ever known me when I'm hungry, you'll know I'm good at crying things in anguish. The man in front of me, slated to have the last bun, refused his hot dog, said I could have it, and walked off. ! Who says chivalry is dead? But I had no bun for my sister, who was perhaps even hungrier than me. I had to bring her a (veggie) dog rolling around in some mustard and ketchup.
The hot dog itself was perplexing. The bun itself had been cooked, inside and out. Although one of the main points of a bun really should be to protect one's fingers from hot dog grease, no such luck here. The bun was greasy and toasty. It was a cheap, sickly sweet store brand hot dog bun with an equally bad hot dog inside.
Guys, I'd forgotten how bad hot dogs can taste. At home I always buy Maverick Ranch lean, low-sodium, flavor packed natural humanely raised beef hot dogs and heap them with Bubbie's fresh sauerkraut (or now, the yummy sweet-hot pickles I bought from a booth at the craft fair). My sister's smelled like it was probably a TofuPup. I can't believe I paid $5 for that.
If I could go back in time, I might've lived on the cupcakes after all.
In other news, Between the Sea and Sky is on NetGalley right now, so if that's your thing, you can find it there!
Well, last weekend I went with my sister to an indie craft fair where she was selling her art. This craft fair had one food vendor (besides people selling the ubiquitous hipster food of the moment, cupcakes) and it was a hot dog cart. Being trapped at a table for about 8 hours as we were, we got hungry and needed food from said hot dog cart. There was always a huge line, but eventually we got so hungry I was willing to brave it.
I got down the stairs and forged through crowds of people to the cart only to be told it was closed for their lunch break and would reopen in 20 minutes. About 40 minutes later (we could see it out of a window behind us) it actually opened. People lined up. They'd been waiting for hot dogs. I watched the line, focusing on a man in a red shirt near the back for visual reference. 20 minutes later, THAT MAN HAD NOT MOVED.
What were these hot dogs, I wondered? Were they grinding the meat themselves? But we were SO HUNGRY. I got in line. I was about the 10th person and after a bit I calculated that it was taking them 5 minutes for each individual hot dog.
I still don't understand. Did they have one teeny tiny cooking apparatus that could only make one hot dog at once?
I waited 40+ minutes to near the front of the line. I was almost there when they said they were out of buns and were going to shut down.
"Can I just get a hot dog without the bun?" I cried, in anguish. If you've ever known me when I'm hungry, you'll know I'm good at crying things in anguish. The man in front of me, slated to have the last bun, refused his hot dog, said I could have it, and walked off. ! Who says chivalry is dead? But I had no bun for my sister, who was perhaps even hungrier than me. I had to bring her a (veggie) dog rolling around in some mustard and ketchup.
The hot dog itself was perplexing. The bun itself had been cooked, inside and out. Although one of the main points of a bun really should be to protect one's fingers from hot dog grease, no such luck here. The bun was greasy and toasty. It was a cheap, sickly sweet store brand hot dog bun with an equally bad hot dog inside.
Guys, I'd forgotten how bad hot dogs can taste. At home I always buy Maverick Ranch lean, low-sodium, flavor packed natural humanely raised beef hot dogs and heap them with Bubbie's fresh sauerkraut (or now, the yummy sweet-hot pickles I bought from a booth at the craft fair). My sister's smelled like it was probably a TofuPup. I can't believe I paid $5 for that.
If I could go back in time, I might've lived on the cupcakes after all.
In other news, Between the Sea and Sky is on NetGalley right now, so if that's your thing, you can find it there!
Friday, September 30, 2011
25 days until Between the Sea and Sky!
So here's a little news roundup.
For one thing, I've seen 2 sales for it on Amazon's BookScan feature. That means somewhere in the Philadelphia area, this book is (or was) ON THE SHELF. Where will it be next? Could you find a copy early? *waits with bated breath* Releasing a book is nerve-racking!!
Thing 2: Now you can preorder the Kindle edition, if that's your thing. I'm sure the Nook edition, etc., will follow shortly. Amazon is usually first to have ebooks posted.
Also, finished copies showed up at my doorstep! And I've got a Goodreads giveaway going on. It ends on the 20th so, if I am reasonably proactive about getting to the post office (no promises) you MIGHT get it by release date.
Also, Magic Under Stone news! I finished the copyedits for Magic Under Stone. And you know what comes after copyedits? It goes to the printer for ARCs!!! It usually takes a little while, still, because everything in publishing takes a little while, but I should have an ARC or two for giveaways fairly soon. Ish.
I'm nervous. My first sequel. As a kid, reading sequels, I was usually disappointed by SOMETHING that happened, because I'd built up an expectation. So it's a little scary to write a sequel knowing that I'll disappoint a lot of people with expectations. Of course, that goes with anything, but I think sequels are worse. Still, I really like this sequel, and it's my longest book to date by a large chunk. I'm very excited for all of you to read it.
And, Dark Metropolis!
Okay, no news about Dark Metropolis, it still doesn't come out for almost two years, but I'm excited, so I just wanted to EXCLAIM the TITLE.
For one thing, I've seen 2 sales for it on Amazon's BookScan feature. That means somewhere in the Philadelphia area, this book is (or was) ON THE SHELF. Where will it be next? Could you find a copy early? *waits with bated breath* Releasing a book is nerve-racking!!
Thing 2: Now you can preorder the Kindle edition, if that's your thing. I'm sure the Nook edition, etc., will follow shortly. Amazon is usually first to have ebooks posted.
Also, finished copies showed up at my doorstep! And I've got a Goodreads giveaway going on. It ends on the 20th so, if I am reasonably proactive about getting to the post office (no promises) you MIGHT get it by release date.
Also, Magic Under Stone news! I finished the copyedits for Magic Under Stone. And you know what comes after copyedits? It goes to the printer for ARCs!!! It usually takes a little while, still, because everything in publishing takes a little while, but I should have an ARC or two for giveaways fairly soon. Ish.
I'm nervous. My first sequel. As a kid, reading sequels, I was usually disappointed by SOMETHING that happened, because I'd built up an expectation. So it's a little scary to write a sequel knowing that I'll disappoint a lot of people with expectations. Of course, that goes with anything, but I think sequels are worse. Still, I really like this sequel, and it's my longest book to date by a large chunk. I'm very excited for all of you to read it.
And, Dark Metropolis!
Okay, no news about Dark Metropolis, it still doesn't come out for almost two years, but I'm excited, so I just wanted to EXCLAIM the TITLE.
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Characters I Wish I'd Created
Man, I suck at coming up with topics to blog about, so today I decided, you know what? Why not just draw inspiration from my old blog? I blogged at Livejournal for 10 years, and some of those posts are worth resurrecting. In one of my first posts, I asked myself what characters I wish I'd created. Here was my list, back in 2002:
Nightcrawler from the X-Men.
Jack Skellington from the Nightmare Before Christmas.
Setzer Gabbiani from Final Fantasy VI.
Jonathan the Zombie Master from the Xanth books.
Saitou Hajime from the anime Rurouni Kenshin.
Tyldak from the Elfquest comics.
Wolf from the 10th Kingdom.
Chaucer from A Knight's Tale.
Auntie Mame from the classic film of the same name starring Rosalind Russell.
I still like all these characters, but, my list would look somewhat different nowadays! I think I'd still take Jonathan the Zombie Master and Wolf. I could see fitting them into a story somewhere. (Of course, Freddy in Dark Metropolis is totally my own Jonathan if I'm being honest.) Usually when I love a character, I end up co-opting the parts of them I like and changing them into something that's mine instead.
Some characters I'd add to the list nowadays:
--Pretty much everyone from Avatar: The Last Airbender, but especially Prince Zuko. Who doesn't love Prince Zuko? And Uncle Iroh because, well, the best characters often come in groups that play off each other, and I can't imagine Zuko without Iroh. But seriously I love that entire cast so much.
--Damon from Vampire Diaries. No need to explain! He steals the show!
--Yasu from NANA. He's a lawyer, also in a rock band, and he's the fallback "protective guy" for everybody, which I love. And he's bald and everyone teases him about it. But he's also really hot. I would never have been able to create him, though, because I can't draw a hot bald guy like Ai Yazawa can. I also love George from her Paradise Kiss manga, but he reminded me of a character I already had at the time, so it's not quite the same.
--Emily of New Moon. It's not like anyone but L. M. Montgomery COULD have written Emily, but now that I'm writing middle grade, I'd kill to have created this character.
--Harold from Harold and Maude. I'm not sure I could pull off the "falling in love with an old lady" part, but I love Harold... Well, I love Maude, too, just...well, the ending of this movie was so depressing.
--Char Aznable from Gundam. Sexy, complicated...one of the most well-known anime characters of all time for a reason...
--Quinton and Sally from the Thieves and Kings comics. The whole cast of this comic is great, but I particularly love how complicated Quinton and Sally are.
I'm sure I could think of a lot more if I wanted to spend all day at this...
Have you ever encountered a character in someone else's story and wished they were yours? (I know plenty of people do, hence, fan fic! Which I did write, myself, as a teenager.) Tell me who!
Nightcrawler from the X-Men.
Jack Skellington from the Nightmare Before Christmas.
Setzer Gabbiani from Final Fantasy VI.
Jonathan the Zombie Master from the Xanth books.
Saitou Hajime from the anime Rurouni Kenshin.
Tyldak from the Elfquest comics.
Wolf from the 10th Kingdom.
Chaucer from A Knight's Tale.
Auntie Mame from the classic film of the same name starring Rosalind Russell.
I still like all these characters, but, my list would look somewhat different nowadays! I think I'd still take Jonathan the Zombie Master and Wolf. I could see fitting them into a story somewhere. (Of course, Freddy in Dark Metropolis is totally my own Jonathan if I'm being honest.) Usually when I love a character, I end up co-opting the parts of them I like and changing them into something that's mine instead.
Some characters I'd add to the list nowadays:
--Pretty much everyone from Avatar: The Last Airbender, but especially Prince Zuko. Who doesn't love Prince Zuko? And Uncle Iroh because, well, the best characters often come in groups that play off each other, and I can't imagine Zuko without Iroh. But seriously I love that entire cast so much.
--Damon from Vampire Diaries. No need to explain! He steals the show!
--Yasu from NANA. He's a lawyer, also in a rock band, and he's the fallback "protective guy" for everybody, which I love. And he's bald and everyone teases him about it. But he's also really hot. I would never have been able to create him, though, because I can't draw a hot bald guy like Ai Yazawa can. I also love George from her Paradise Kiss manga, but he reminded me of a character I already had at the time, so it's not quite the same.
--Emily of New Moon. It's not like anyone but L. M. Montgomery COULD have written Emily, but now that I'm writing middle grade, I'd kill to have created this character.
--Harold from Harold and Maude. I'm not sure I could pull off the "falling in love with an old lady" part, but I love Harold... Well, I love Maude, too, just...well, the ending of this movie was so depressing.
--Char Aznable from Gundam. Sexy, complicated...one of the most well-known anime characters of all time for a reason...
--Quinton and Sally from the Thieves and Kings comics. The whole cast of this comic is great, but I particularly love how complicated Quinton and Sally are.
I'm sure I could think of a lot more if I wanted to spend all day at this...
Have you ever encountered a character in someone else's story and wished they were yours? (I know plenty of people do, hence, fan fic! Which I did write, myself, as a teenager.) Tell me who!
Friday, September 9, 2011
On Retellings, Reworkings, Homages, Rip-offs
No story exists in a vacuum. There is, as they say, nothing new under the sun. But some stories draw a bit more heavily on predecessors than others. Meanwhile, many authors bite their nails while reading new deal announcements because they think, "OH NO THAT IS WHAT I'M WRITING!" Cassandra Clare sold the Infernal Devices books not longer before Magic Under Glass sold and I thought, "Oh noes! Clockwork Prince? My book has a clockwork prince in it!!!" It doesn't take much for us to freak out.
What about when the borrowing is conscious? What's the difference between a retelling, a reworking, an homage, or...PLAGIARISM!?
Ultimately? The author will intend one thing, the reader will get another. I've seen reviews about Magic Under Glass that felt it was just a flat-out rip-off of Jane Eyre, other reviews that appreciated the nod but noted that the book goes in a completely different direction. But I'm going to attempt some definitions.
Retelling
A retelling sticks to the basic structure of the original story at heart. Retellings are usually of fairy tales, myths, or classics. If it is no longer under copyright, it's up for grabs. If character and setting is your strength as a writer and plot is not, then retellings might be a great option for you. The story is already there! The trouble, of course, is putting a new twist on it, like changing a character's gender, telling the story from an unusual POV (like the villain's perspective...perhaps we see they aren't as villainous as we thought), or picking a quirky setting.
Reworking
A reworking, in my mind, is when you take a pre-existing story and start twisting it enough that it no longer resembles the original enough to be a straight-out retelling, but the reader can still recognize the source material in there somewhere.
Homage
An homage, or "nod" to a previous work, might be even farther from the original source. I also think it is different from a reworking in that you can nod to several things at once. It might not be terribly obvious except to readers who are big fans of the source material.
Still, the line between reworking and homage can be blurry indeed. I tend to feel that if your story BEGAN with the original material, it is a reworking. To me, Dark Metropolis is a reworking of the 1927 film Metropolis because it began with the premise of "What if the underground workers in Metropolis were dead?" Then I wondered what it would be like if I switched the genders of the characters in Metropolis. THEN things started getting off-track and less recognizable, but, it still began with Metropolis. Magic Under Glass, OTOH, came from the desire simply to write a book along the lines of classic novels about girls in reduced circumstances who fall in love in a house full of secrets, inspired by not just Jane Eyre, but A Little Princess, The Secret Garden, and Rebecca. So, to me, it is an homage.
Finally, we come to just plain ripping off someone else's work. This usually happens between two relatively modern works--if you write something about Lizzie Bennett, it's not longer a rip-off, it's acceptable fan fic, right? You can plagiarize anything--a character, a story, a phrase, even a style, although you can't be sued for borrowing a style!
The thing about ripping off stories is, it doesn't happen as much as readers seem to think it does. Strange coincidences happen between two books all the time. Apparently Tera Lynn Childs' mermaid books have a character named Dosinia and so does Between the Sea and Sky. It's the name of a mollusk, but I'm braced for someone to think I ripped it from Forgive My Fins. I promise you...I had nooo idea. Between the Sea and Sky was finished before Forgive My Fins came out, even though it's released much later. People seemed to come out of the woodwork to sue J. K. Rowling because they'd written a book about wizards, or had creatures named "Muggles" in their story, or whatever.
It goes without saying, obviously, published writers shouldn't plagiarize. Some writers avoid reading stories resembling their own while writing to avoid subconscious plagiarism. I, meanwhile, try to read everything that sounds like something I'm working on so that if I do find a similar element, I can change it. But no one can entirely defy the might of the collective unconscious!
If you're a beginning/intermediate writer not yet gunning for publication, however? I say, rip off characters, plot and style freely. Artists copy other artists, why shouldn't you? I was a shameless borrower in my youth, so my "original" stories often read like a fan-fic mashup with characters from a dozen different books or movies, perhaps thinly disguised by a name change. Stylewise, at different point in my life I tried to write like The Mists of Avalon, The Babysitter's Club, Francesca Lia Block, Marvel Comics, Piers Anthony, and L. M. Montgomery. Feel free to write fan fic, too, if that's your speed. My only advice for the young writer as far as borrowing goes is just to draw from incredibly disparate elements. That's how you'll end up with your own style. Look at all the writers who wrote as much like Tolkien as they could manage in the high fantasy genre for decades. Let's try and move away from that! If people praise my work for being original and creative now, trust me, it's because when I was about 13 I thought it would be a great idea to combine elements of The Nightmare Before Christmas, Seinfeld and Arthurian lore into one story...I still like to look for the quirky in my story choices, although I've gotten a bit wiser about it!
What about when the borrowing is conscious? What's the difference between a retelling, a reworking, an homage, or...PLAGIARISM!?
Ultimately? The author will intend one thing, the reader will get another. I've seen reviews about Magic Under Glass that felt it was just a flat-out rip-off of Jane Eyre, other reviews that appreciated the nod but noted that the book goes in a completely different direction. But I'm going to attempt some definitions.
Retelling
A retelling sticks to the basic structure of the original story at heart. Retellings are usually of fairy tales, myths, or classics. If it is no longer under copyright, it's up for grabs. If character and setting is your strength as a writer and plot is not, then retellings might be a great option for you. The story is already there! The trouble, of course, is putting a new twist on it, like changing a character's gender, telling the story from an unusual POV (like the villain's perspective...perhaps we see they aren't as villainous as we thought), or picking a quirky setting.
Reworking
A reworking, in my mind, is when you take a pre-existing story and start twisting it enough that it no longer resembles the original enough to be a straight-out retelling, but the reader can still recognize the source material in there somewhere.
Homage
An homage, or "nod" to a previous work, might be even farther from the original source. I also think it is different from a reworking in that you can nod to several things at once. It might not be terribly obvious except to readers who are big fans of the source material.
Still, the line between reworking and homage can be blurry indeed. I tend to feel that if your story BEGAN with the original material, it is a reworking. To me, Dark Metropolis is a reworking of the 1927 film Metropolis because it began with the premise of "What if the underground workers in Metropolis were dead?" Then I wondered what it would be like if I switched the genders of the characters in Metropolis. THEN things started getting off-track and less recognizable, but, it still began with Metropolis. Magic Under Glass, OTOH, came from the desire simply to write a book along the lines of classic novels about girls in reduced circumstances who fall in love in a house full of secrets, inspired by not just Jane Eyre, but A Little Princess, The Secret Garden, and Rebecca. So, to me, it is an homage.
Finally, we come to just plain ripping off someone else's work. This usually happens between two relatively modern works--if you write something about Lizzie Bennett, it's not longer a rip-off, it's acceptable fan fic, right? You can plagiarize anything--a character, a story, a phrase, even a style, although you can't be sued for borrowing a style!
The thing about ripping off stories is, it doesn't happen as much as readers seem to think it does. Strange coincidences happen between two books all the time. Apparently Tera Lynn Childs' mermaid books have a character named Dosinia and so does Between the Sea and Sky. It's the name of a mollusk, but I'm braced for someone to think I ripped it from Forgive My Fins. I promise you...I had nooo idea. Between the Sea and Sky was finished before Forgive My Fins came out, even though it's released much later. People seemed to come out of the woodwork to sue J. K. Rowling because they'd written a book about wizards, or had creatures named "Muggles" in their story, or whatever.
It goes without saying, obviously, published writers shouldn't plagiarize. Some writers avoid reading stories resembling their own while writing to avoid subconscious plagiarism. I, meanwhile, try to read everything that sounds like something I'm working on so that if I do find a similar element, I can change it. But no one can entirely defy the might of the collective unconscious!
If you're a beginning/intermediate writer not yet gunning for publication, however? I say, rip off characters, plot and style freely. Artists copy other artists, why shouldn't you? I was a shameless borrower in my youth, so my "original" stories often read like a fan-fic mashup with characters from a dozen different books or movies, perhaps thinly disguised by a name change. Stylewise, at different point in my life I tried to write like The Mists of Avalon, The Babysitter's Club, Francesca Lia Block, Marvel Comics, Piers Anthony, and L. M. Montgomery. Feel free to write fan fic, too, if that's your speed. My only advice for the young writer as far as borrowing goes is just to draw from incredibly disparate elements. That's how you'll end up with your own style. Look at all the writers who wrote as much like Tolkien as they could manage in the high fantasy genre for decades. Let's try and move away from that! If people praise my work for being original and creative now, trust me, it's because when I was about 13 I thought it would be a great idea to combine elements of The Nightmare Before Christmas, Seinfeld and Arthurian lore into one story...I still like to look for the quirky in my story choices, although I've gotten a bit wiser about it!
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