Q: I've been working with a publisher to publish my first novel for two years now. Just last month, a novel published by a
different house came out that was basically the same plot as mine but with different character and setting names. I'm worried this will affect sales of my own copyrighted work. Can I sue?
A:
Maybe. If you suspect that your manuscript was leaked, or some how obtained by the other author and that formed the basis for their own story, then yes, you may be able to sue under various legal theories.
On the other hand, independent creation is a defense to copyright infringement. It is not uncommon for two or more authors to come up with similar stories or works of art. Mere coincidence that they are similar does not amount to infringement. If there are wholesale verbatim identical passages as between your work and their work, then it's more likely there was some misappropriation. I recommend you do some kind of word-for-word comparison to identify the degree of similarity. There are online tools for this purpose.
Good luck!
Griffin Klema
https://klemalaw.com
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