Telling if your story is too similar to another one

The percentage of people who have seen Princess Mononoke is small.

Also, LOTS of romances and LOTS of political stories are just ripping off Romeo/Juliet and Hamlet, respectively. Don't worry about it, and just do it well. No one will care, even Mononoke fans.

Disclaimer: Princess Mononoke is one of my favourite movies. That being said, your story does remind me a lot of it. As Harlequin said, not many people would have seen the movie, but I think those who have, would definitely notice the similarities and not in a good way.

Perhaps consider dropping some of the subplots or tweaking some of the aspects of your novel so that the similarities wouldn't be as glaring as they are now? Personally, I didn't have a problem with the story up until the meeting with the fox goddess but from then on, it reminded me too much of Princess Mononoke so maybe focus on the second part of the narrative?

I don't think the theme is a problem - there are a finite number of themes and story structures in the world, after all. But the theme, coupled with the two towns, coupled with the forest god awakening is what screamed 'Priness Mononoke' to me. These are just my two cents, as always : )

Yep, my mind went to Princess Mononoke immediately. It's a great premise and great theme and I don't see why you couldn't add your own spin on it. You just need to make sure you foreground that unique spin in the query and in the synopsis.

i may be part of a very very very small group....but i don't see it as ripping off the story or idea. i mean, if someone were to use my story for inspiration for their story i'd be all like "wait...someone knew my story enough to wanna write one just like it? woah...that means someone FOUND me and spread me out to the world...again!" just as long as at some point they do acknowledge me for giving them inspiration. there's too much negativity in this world already. need more positivity!

and Princess Mononoke is awesome!

On it's face the premise does remind me an awful lot of Princess Mononoke, but where it ends up may be quite different. Be cognizant of the similarities and don't let yourself write a 'rip-off'. At the same time, if you do try to write and your entire process revolves around how to make it different from Princess Mononoke you might have to step back and evaluate whether this is the story you want to be writing.

Why not just change some of the most glaringly Mononoke-like elements? For example, make your MC female. Don't make her a huntress or an archer (I don't know why they'd send a huntsman to organise trade anyway; that's the job for a trader) to minimise any likeness to Ashitaka. Why not make the gods human form who can control animals? Or make them dragons or elementals or something. Or spirits who can take human form but not control animals. Can you base your characters/setting on something very different to the oriental themes of Princess Mononoke? For example, The Witcher uses Eastern European folklore as a basis (its author is Polish). And don't make the story about finding a cure for a sickness (not sure how trading furs and getting gold/weapons would accomplish that anyway if the one person (apothecary) who can work up a cure, is also sick).

Also, are village/industrial boreal town/forest the only settings? Could you flesh out your world to make it a bigger place filled with its own customs and folklore etc?

Step back a moment and consider: You suspect your story might be "too" similar to another that you admire. That very suspicion, to me, is a symptom that you are correct about your suspicion.

caw

blacbird said:

Step back a moment and consider: You suspect your story might be "too" similar to another that you admire. That very suspicion, to me, is a symptom that you are correct about your suspicion.

caw

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This, basically. Assuming that you've seen the film, I imagine the reason why you've pieced together the story in that way is because you remember seeing the film so each step naturally fits.

Think about what excites you about your story- maybe narrow it down to the core element and change the rest of the details.

Harlequin said:

The percentage of people who have seen Princess Mononoke is small.

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I have, but I forgot enough to recognize the similarities.

So if the disease is caused by angering Venaria, does that make it a venarial disease? You might want to change the name.

Don't worry about whether your story idea is "original." There are very few truly original ideas anyway.

What makes a story shine is not the idea, but its execution. Here's a little blog post I wrote on the worthlessness of ideas.

Devil Ledbetter said:

Don't worry about whether your story idea is "original." There are very few truly original ideas anyway.

What makes a story shine is not the idea, but its execution. Here's a little blog post I wrote on the worthlessness of ideas.

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I read this post a little while ago and still love it!


Also, OP, I think it's all in the execution. And people get inspired by other books/media all the time. It really depends on what is done with it. Just because it started as a Princess Mononoke-esque story doesn't mean it has to stay that way. Let the stoey breathe for a few days/weeks and come back to it.

Devil Ledbetter said:

Don't worry about whether your story idea is "original." There are very few truly original ideas anyway.

What makes a story shine is not the idea, but its execution. Here's a little blog post I wrote on the worthlessness of ideas.

Click to expand...

Yes, good point. I think your plot might even fit Ulysses and the Cyclops.

blacbird said:

Step back a moment and consider: You suspect your story might be "too" similar to another that you admire. That very suspicion, to me, is a symptom that you are correct about your suspicion.

caw

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Listening to your gut is a good idea. I've found that whenever I've had the niggling feeling of something being wrong, that even when I've just ignored it because fixing that part would be harder than leaving it be, it's always turned out to be right.

If you want to make your story feel more your own creation, stop and ask yourself 'why' whenever you get that feeling you're copying too closely. Why does that character, scene, or situation act or play out the way it does? Because that's the way it makes sense for your story, or because that's how it worked in the source you're drawing from?

Look at the rash of imitators of popular series like Harry Potter, Harry Dresden, Game of Thrones, 50 Shades, etc. Some of those still managed to be enjoyable in their own right, despite being fairly derivative. The bad ones often failed the 'why' test, because you looked at them, asked, 'why is that character acting like that? why did that happen?' and the answer was, 'because that's how it happened in Game of Thrones, and the author is just cargo-culting what Jim Butcher did even when it really doesn't work in this new story.'

blacbird said:

Step back a moment and consider: You suspect your story might be "too" similar to another that you admire. That very suspicion, to me, is a symptom that you are correct about your suspicion.

caw

Click to expand...

Yeah, I think whether it's objectively a problem or not, if you, the writer, feel uncomfortable, then it's probably best to think about how you can increase your comfort. More often than not, there are relatively small changes you can make to make the similarities less obvious.

Pretty much everything you write will be similar to something already written.

Now many stores of "unlikely band of misfits (that don't get along) have to come together to conquer [something]" have you ever encountered? To me, this story line accounts for about half of what I find out there.

The major lines of stories have mostly been beat to death - BUT you can still find a way to make your work unique and interesting by introducing your POV, or a twist to a tried and true story line. You can even combine much used story lines to make something new.

I, personally, would start all over. It would seem that you've got this princess on the brain and can't kick it out of there. Years from now you'll still have nagging doubts. It ain't worth it, kid. That's my two-bit take on it all. "Borrow" something from Shakespeare. He won't mind.

Haven't seen the movie, so I can't comment intelligently there.

I do, however, write a lot of fairy tale retellings (eight novels). The important thing, I believe, is to bring something new to the table. So, for instance, in Snow White and the Civil War, I brought in stuff that a lot of people don't know about how California was crucial to the Union victory.

So, say you have an Avatar-like tale about how natives of a place know more, have some vital secret, that their technologically superior conquerors lack. That's your theme. Technology does not equal virtue/the apex of knowledge. It's okay to reuse themes all you want. They strike a chord with us for a reason.

But DON'T set it on an alternate planet, and for heaven's sake, don't involve any flying dragons. Changing setting and/or world building (I tend to lump them together) is the easiest place to make your story unique.

Characters are even more crucial. Okay, you can change the sex or race of the protag, and that will change the story. But that's not enough.

Think of all the remakes you've seen. Does it bother you that they're so derivative? The Karate Kid remake was set in China, and it even had Jackie Chan, but that wasn't enough to save it for me. It didn't really bring anything new to the table. And don't get me started on Star Wars. If I have to hear about the Death Star again, I swear I'll commit an act of violence against a DVD.

Take your theme and see if you can brainstorm a setting and a character who will be different. What if you took your Avatar scenario and put it in a steampunk? You could make your protag a Calamity Jane type who's befriended native Americans in the past. But maybe she has an laudanum addiction, and the only place she can get it is from the folks who are screwing the native tribes. By adding in the tension between addiction and the cognitive dissonance of surrendering everything she is to satisfy this, along with unsuccessful attempts to reconcile the two, you could have a different tale--at least different enough that it would be worth doing, with the normal caveat that execution is everything.

Note: please don't tear into my brainstormed scenario, peeps. I don't intend on writing it. I'm just putting it out there as a possible example of what can be done. Maybe it would turn out to be offensive and shouldn't be written. But you can't worry about that stuff while you're coming up with ideas.

Anyway, I hope something here is useful.

True originality is as good as impossible.
Strive to make your approach original.
But, echoing other comments above, if you yourself feel it's too similar to Princess Mononoke, you're better off trying something different.

Never seen the movie. I'd guess most people haven't, just going by statistics. You're worrying about a small portion of people who MIGHT recognize the connection between the two. Just write it and enjoy it.

And there are a million books on the strong male MC, his clever female interest, a bunch of mercenaries following them - and many of those books do just fine. As long as the story is developed with lots of originality, the intersecting similarity shouldn't be such a big deal.

Being well read is key to recognizing this which you prove you are by seeing the similarities. It's good that you caught it. If they're so close, you have to change something and you might need to not watch that movie for a while. It might have subliminally slipped into you head while you were working. This happens to all of us. I see something cool in a movie and think 'That would be great in my story.' Usually, though, I wait a day or two to make the change. Sometimes I go with it, but often times I don't. I would definitely make changes for sure, but you also have to realize that no matter what you write, others will compare it to something else. Even the best works are like this. Just go over it and see what you can make different and for the better. Hopefully better than that movie.