So what would you do if you are a plagiarizing author?

What would you do if you are a 19-year-old girl whose debut novel has been such a hit?

You have suddenly become the darling of the literature world and are being flown around the world for book signing and speaking engagements. Your publisher is so pleased with your work that you are immediately commissioned to write two more books. A major Hollywood producer also buys the rights of your book, How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild and Got a Life, to make it into a movie.

Then suddenly someone finds out that your debut book has similar passages to another book written a few years ago. You don’t get panic. You tell the world that you have a good memory and could have subconsciously included these passages into your book. You add that you could have internalized the passages as you were so engrossed in the first book. Your publisher agrees with you and asks you to remove the similar (same?) passages in the new prints.

Then suddenly all hell breaks loose. Readers and at least three other prominent authors accuse you of lifting their passages in your debut novel. The similarities are uncanny.

This time around, your excuses do not stand. Your publisher pulls out your books from the stands and withdraws the commissions for your new work. Your fellow undergraduates at Harvard University now look at you with contempt. The entire literary world thinks you are an embarrassment. A newspaper you used to work as an intern two years ago are re-looking at your articles again to see their authenticity. Everyone now replaces your “internalizing” term with plagiarism.

So what would you do if you were Kaavya Viswanathan (pix)?

I think for starters she could internalize her own roller-coaster ride in the past year in a new all action fiction – writing about her triumphs and downfalls and what got her attracted to plagiarism – whether intentionally or otherwise. Surely a best seller, don't you think?

Alternative, if she still can’t find her own words to write, she can always seek or lift some ideas/words from non-English fictions and internalize them for her English fiction.

Or she could just concentrate on her studies and leave writing to those who can.