Holy crap, I'm struggling. I'm struggling every way that I possibly can. I was already dealing with a bunch of different things (physical health issues, family issues, church issues, and job issues) when yesterday I was searching on Amazon only to find that a book called "Memoirs of a Gaijin" already exists. And even worse than that, it has only been published recently. I called my publishing company to see if there was any way I could change the title of the book, but since it had already gone to the printer, there is nothing that can be done.
Despite the fact that Grainne has assured me that titles of books are not/cannot be copyrighted, I'm freaking out a little bit here. I'm scared that if the book does as well as I hope it does, it will open the doors for a law suit or something else equally stupid. Then again, it appears that "Memoirs of a Gaijin" is not exactly original - there are several blogs by that name on the Internet.
While I am scared about the whole law suit thing, the thing that I am even more bummed out about is the fact that I didn't do my research before I submitted my manuscript (although, in all fairness, the other book was published after my manuscript had already been submitted under that title). I also thought I was being SOOO cute and SOOOO original - OBVIOUSLY that is not the case.
Even though there is NOTHING that I can do about it at this point, I feel like this is the straw that broke the camel's back. I'm in a tail spin and am having a hard time putting things into perspective and pulling out of it.
4 comments:
I'm sorry about what you are experiencing. If you need a bodyguard let me know...
I don't know if I'll need a bodyguard, but I might need a good lawyer.
Erin, I am not supposed to give legal advice to those who are not firm clients, so I am posting anonymously, but you probably know who I am. At any rate, copyright issues revolve around the actual content of the book and courts take a multi-level approach. You can't copyright actual ideas, only the way they are expressed. So, unless you copied actual language (unlikely) or characters (even more unlikely, since your book is all true personal anecdotes) from somebody else, there will be no copyright lawsuit. Also, your friend is probably correct that the title is too short to be copyrightable. As far as trademark issues go, your title probably falls into the "descriptive mark" category, as opposed to the "arbitrary or suggestive mark" category, and I doubt that any other author has been able to attach secondary meaning to their work. Basically, don't worry. You shouldn't really have any liability here. But remember, I didn't tell you that.
While I didn't understand most of what you just said, I did understand the, "you shouldn't really have any liability here", and I am HAPPY.
However, if there DOES happen to be a lawsuit, I will totally hire you. Even if you are still in law school, I totally learned on "Legally Blonde" that law students can operate under the supervision of a licensed lawyer.
Maybe I can be your first pro bono case! Or, I will pay you the entire advance I got on my book - $1!
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