Twilight author Stephenie Meyer has been sued for copyright infringement by an author who claims that significant portions of Meyer’s fourth and as-of-yet final book in the series, Breaking Dawn, published in August, 2008 were lifted from a story she posted online in 2003. Last week TMZ published the cease and desist from the author, Jordan Scott, which detailed the similarities between the two books, including plot structure and some minor dialogue. (Here’s a spoiler filled link to TMZ’s coverage of the author’s case against Meyer. Please be warned that TMZ’s article and the PDF legal document pretty much ruin the fourth Twilight book/movie. If you haven’t read the book and are planning to or don’t want to ruin the movie, don’t read it. I waited to read the legal document until I finished the book later last week.)
Scott just officially filed suit against Meyer yesterday and is asking for damages and requesting that all existing copies of Breaking Dawn be impounded. Good luck on that one.
The author of the “Twilight” series is being sued by a woman who claims the 4th installment is a rip-off of her work.
Jordan Scott claims in her lawsuit, filed today in federal court, that she began writing a novel “in the vampire genre” when she was just 15 — back in 2003. The novel was published in 2006 and called “The Nocturne.”
Scott claims the 4th installment of Stephenie Meyer’s “Twilight” series lifted her work. She says Meyer’s book — “Breaking Dawn” is a “significant literary departure from [her] early books…” She says it seems the book is “written by a teenager.” Yes, Scott was a teenager when she wrote “The Nocturne.”
Scott claims the two books “show striking, articulable and substantial similarities in the … plot lines, themes, dialogue, mood, setting, pace, characters, sequence of events, ideas and other similarities.”
Scott is asking for damages, and that the court impound the “Breaking Dawn” books that are being sold.
[From TMZ]
I read through the legal document a couple of times, and I have to say that if I was on a jury for this case – not that it’s ever likely to go to a jury trial – I wouldn’t be able to rule in Scott’s favor given the evidence that’s presented. I can believe that Scott feels that Meyer ripped off her story, and there are some very strong plot parallels between the two books and even some similar wording. I don’t think it’s a frivolous lawsuit, but they don’t present enough evidence to prove a case. Some of the wording is similar, but not strikingly so. The common character dialogue isn’t exceptionally unique. Two weaker examples are that both books have lead characters who call their male partners “love,” as in “my love,” and another scene in which one of the leads marvels over their partner’s beauty, as if that’s significant. The things that the author claims are the same plot points are very common human experiences adapted to the vampire world. There are some things that seem too alike for coincidence, but I’m not going to get into the specifics as I don’t want to spoil it for anyone. I haven’t decided either way and the case is not strong, but not completely without merit.
Minor past spoiler for True Blood below
Many of you have pointed out that the Southern Vampire Mysteries, which were published well ahead of Meyer’s Twilight series and are the books on which the HBO show True Blood is based, have many commonalities with Meyer’s books as well. There’s a mind-reader, a character named Sam who plays the second “more of a friend” love interest and has incredibly similar powers to Sam in the Twilight books, and the vampires have skin glows and sparkles. (I’m almost done with the first novel in the series, Dead Until Dark, and it’s a lot of fun. Thanks to Bodhi and Laura for recommending it! I’m also watching the first season of “True Blood” now and love it.) Maybe many of these concepts are similar in the vampire genre. I’ve never really delved into it before except for Ann Rice and it’s been over 15 year since I’ve read any of her books.
Meyer didn’t come up with Twilight in a vacuum, but whether her similar ideas venture into the realm of plagiarism remains to be seen.
Stephenie Meyer is shown at the premiere of Twilight on 11/17/08. Credit: WENN.com
🙂 Yay! You’re more than welcome! I’m glad your reading the series; its SO FREAKING AWESOME!
I’ve read every book Charlaine Harris has written; at least all the ones my library has… :nerd:
Horizontal lines/stripes are never (ever) a good idea. Especially on the red carpet.
Tsk tsk…
On another note, I am still untouched by the Twilight “saga” grace. I just can’t see the light. I’ve tried Twilight itself, the book. Couldn’t make it past the first few chapters. I finished reading New Moon entirely as I lost a bet. It seems to me that the always hot wolf is much more interesting and healthy as a friend/boyfriend than the stalker vampire…
I tried the first chapters of the two remaining books and failed.
Bad writing and cheesy, predictable plots don’t work for me.
However, it’s going to be tough for the then-teenage author to win this case.
It will be very easy for the other party to show that many other books have the same plotlines (especially in these impossible love affairs à la Romeo&Juliet), themes, chronological construction, etc.
Which just points out how Meyer’s work is very much unoriginal (the Twihards are going to hate me for saying this).
Good thing you’ve moved onto True Blood and the Southern Vampire Mysteries, CB!
Don’t you just love the opening credits for TB? (“I wanna do bad things with you…”)
Putting all the twilight hype aside, Stephany Meyer is a horrible writer
Thanks Bodhi – the Harris books are so much better! They’re a lot hotter too. @Bellatrix – it is hard to get into Twilight at first, but I eventually did. I was put off by the writing too, and I found the Edward character stalkerish in Eclipse. He gets better. They were fun, easy reads and I did keep going because I wanted to see what happened. I do get the appeal.
Hell yeah! Brown chicken brow cow!
@Bellatrix: “Don’t you just love the opening credits for TB? (”I wanna do bad things with you…”)”
I just bought the soundtrack! I love it. The show has grown on me.
@CB: I understand the appeal in today’s world but that doesn’t make the Twilight Saga any better in my eyes. 🙂 I can’t help it. I do, however, notice that many people have read the books in the end and appreciated them.
@Green is God: the soundtrack is amazing! I admit I also bought it. I actually ended up choreographing a piece to Bleed 2 Feed.
If you don’t have the edition that has several bonus tracks, you should try to get a hand on those (a few CC Adcock & The Lafayette Marquis live songs that are great).
I have no desire to read Twilight. This is coming from a Harry Potter fan who also was excited to see The Chronicle of Narnia!
The twilight premise loses me the moment they claim that Vampires can walk in daylight. That’s a tenet that you don’t cross in Vampire-lore! There has to be a counter-balance — a high price to pay for benefits of being one of the undead. In the Twilight series they seems to have all the perks without any of the biggest drawbacks:
– can walk in daylight
– can have children
Seriously, it loses WAY too much of the drama of being undead!
While I wish every writer, published or unpublished, all the best, I have to admit I’m severely underwhelmed by Meyer and Twilight.
I’ve only read Twilight because I had two very good friends who begged me to read it because they LOVED IT SO MUCH AND THEY JUST KNEW I WOULD LOVE IT TOO !!!!1!1!!!! My friends are 42 and 32 and they are just stupid giggly for the Twilight series. I’m 42 and I was absolutely horrified by the entire book.
Not only did I think Edward was a creepy ass stalker, his family mentally deranged (except for Dr. Cullen, whom I actually liked) and the special features lame (Edward sparkles? Like a fairy princess???), I also thought the writing was boring, juvenile and assumed it was written by a person who was desperately unpopular in high school, who had a crush on the most popular boy in school and who spend all four years daydreaming about Mr. Popular suddenly discovering her and begging her to ride off into the sunset with him.
I carefully dodged giving any serious or negative comments about the book to my friends. I didn’t want to ruin it for them and I didn’t want them to think I was criticizing them. But as Goddess as my witness, I would have sworn that book was written by an unworldly teenager covered in pimples and carrying an extra 40 pounds.
As for the similarities between vampire stories, there is the standard vampire lore that crosses over from writer to writer, story to story (drinking blood, the eroticism/ecstasy that arises during the blood drinking, the pack/herd nature, the yearning for the normality of humanity that “good” vampires have, etc…) but skin that sparkles? Twilight is the first time I’ve seen that. If another writer posted that on the Internet near the time Meyer was writing her books, I can see why Meyer’s use of it is suspect. I’m not saying two strangers can’t have very similar ideas at the same time (It has happened to me many times and it freaks me out every time) But I can see why Scott is raising the questions she is raising.
And I agree about that dress Meyer is wearing. I love the dress but not on a woman her size. The style is fine, the stripes aren’t.
Also, I may hate her writing but I love her hair. It’s alway so pretty. Kudos to your hair stylist, Steph!
It saddens me that there really seems to be no real evidence for this lawsuit. I would love it if Stephanie Meyer got sued for millions and lost. But it would probably only create a small dent in this vast fortune she’s amassed for unleashing her stupidity upon the world.
but skin that sparkles? Twilight is the first time I’ve seen that.
Nope it’s been done before but the word used was that or she the vampire glowed and that they used some sort of glamour to shield their real looks.
Vampire lores and myths can only go so far and some authors added their own spin on it, can an author really stake a claim on something that kind of lifted themselves from folklore themselves.
perhaps it’s my lack of creativity… but a vampire that sparkles when faced with its enemy the sun, where’s the danger in that? And for that reason alone, twilight will always be a soft vampire story meant for children.
She says it seems the book is “written by a teenager.”
that comment is meant for the 4th book only? I had to put down the first book for that very reason, so that’s a poor argument.
I attempted to read a copy of Jordan Scott’s book online. Unfortunately for her, it sucks. I couldn’t get past the first few pages. I have read Breaking Dawn and the passages Ms. Scott presents as evidence. Frankly, I am not convinced. She is using this as a stepping stone to jump start her career. Vampire stories, many stories in general, can all have similarities. Not to mention the fact Stephanie Meyer had copyrighted the Breaking Dawn book under a pen name (Morgan-her middle name) before Jordan Scott wrote her book. Another thing worth mentioning is age and experience. Scott’s book was written as a teenager and Meyers as an adult. The obvious barriers and skill represent those factors. I am most def in favor of Stephanie Meyer and hope Ms. Scott drops this soon.
If you want to read about Vampires, read “The Strain”. Scary stuff.
Just checked out the synopsis of The Strain on Amazon.com. That sounds good!
A book I would recommend that has the same vampires-are-animals theme is Anno, Dracula. In that book, Dracula is a far cry from the smokin’ hot sexy version of Gary Oldman (in the London scenes, of course).
Maddie, that could be why I have never heard of the sparkles concept. I’m used to supernatural characters that glow and use glamours and such but I had never heard of sparkles. When I first read it in Twilight I immediately thought of the body lotions that have micro glitter in them and I’ll admit, I snickered obnoxiously at the idea of Edward slathering down with cotton candy scented glitter lotion. Or maybe vanilla scented….
i haven’t read twilight or any of the series and i haven’t see the movie, but i heard that she “borrowed” the plots from classics for each novel – like romeo and juliet, wuthering heights, etc…
Yay!! Not only did I get mentioned, but someone else is reading the Sookie Stackhouse series! I’m so happy this morning 🙂
The books get even better, Celebitchy. And you’re right. I also kept up reading Twilight just so I could find out what happens, not because I like the writing…the writing was…juvenile at times. The same words over and over. You have to read this review by Lainey of the 4th book. I laughed so hard:
http://www.laineygossip.com/Breaking-Dawn-books-reviews.aspx But back to Sookie.
You have to tell us what you think about the second and third books when you’re done with them. The second book differs a lot from the 2nd season of True Blood and some parts have me scratching my head about what they’re going to do for Season 3 of the show!
(scribbing down the name of the book the Strain to check out later)
I’m on the fifth Sookie Stackhouse vampire novel (out of a series of nine books) and I keep looking back at the copyright date. Charlaine Harris wrote these books before the Twilight series and dang if there aren’t a LOT of similarities. I think Meyer ripped off Harris, not this other woman.
Woot for Sookie Stackhouse! The similiarities between the two series are hilarious. The most notable difference, of course, is that Harris can actually write.
I don’t care how it’s done, I just hope something or someone is able to stop Stephenie Meyer from writing one more word of Twilight.
So happy to read that there are others like me who can’t stand the Twilight books. I just finished a romance writing course and half the women in the class were crazy for this series and wouldn’t SHUTUP about it. I got halfway into the first chapter and tried to gouge out my eyes. Luckily, my husband was there to stop me. The only high point for me is that it seems that no matter how BAD the writing, how TIRED the plot and BANAL the characters, any author can get published these days. You don’t even have to try hard. Just write any old sh*t. Someone will read it.
Uh, CC, Stephenie Meyer didn’t even have the idea for Twilight until June 2 2003. I don’t think she had Breaking Dawn copyrighted anywhere near 2003.
Not that I think this lawsuit has any more cred then the Harry Potter Lawsuit(s), Just saying is all.
I had the great displeasure of reading “Twilight” a few years ago, when a roommate of mine kept raving over it and slobbering at the lip. I picked it up and had to laugh- calling it a novel is giving S. Meyer waaay too much credit.
The author writes with as much panache as a baloney sandwich. The dialogue… don’t even get me started. There are so many wonderful, literary books out there to enjoy- why waste your time with a shitty G-rated series of questionable quality.
Really, these books SUCK BALLS. They are AWFUL.
The “Twilight” books almost, but not quite, are the Anita Blake books without the sex, the fun, the excitement, the action and the actual STORY.
Laurell K. Hamilton should sue Meyer on principle, Anita is torn between the solid, sexy werewolf/shapeshifter Richard and the other-wordly beautiful Jean-Claude the vampire. But Anita is neither helpless or wishy-washy like Meyer’s female lead.
Who would want to admit they had any part of their writing associated with Twilight to begin with?? I read them, hated them, but felt I shouldn’t judge something I’d never seen. As a fan of the Vampire genre Meyer’s does vampires a disservice, they fall more into the “fae” than actual vampires. So really if you want to read good vampire novels Twilight wouldn’t be on the suggested reading list.
THESE ladies can tell stories about vampires and tell them well, great writing, great stories, no predictability.
Anne Rice
Charlaine Harris
Kim Harrison
Laurell K. Hamilton