Ned Vizzini Stole My Book

So some of you (because there actually is a “you” now) may know that I participated in NaNoWriMo last year. My book was about a boy named Nate who, through a surprising series of events, ended up in a psych ward.
Ned Vizzini wrote my book.
Okay, so It’s Kind of a Funny Story isn’t exactly my book, but it’s pretty dang close.
There is a dancing scene. There is a scene in which one of the hospital veterans rattles off information about all of the patients. The main character is an extremely intelligent high school freshman who finds himself overwhelmed by the stress placed upon him. There is a thin, blond girl with obvious issues who the main character has a thing for.
There are A LOT of similarities.
Also, Ned Vizzini uses "y'know". While Nate (my main character) doesn't use it, he does criticize it as a sign of “the degeneration of the English language” at multiple points in my book. The fact that it appears often in both of our novels... is annoying to me. It was MINE. Why did frikkin’ Ned have to use it too?
Ned did strike on a few things that I wish I'd included in my novel, like the presence of the DSM IV (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders Version 4) in every mental health professionals office that you will ever enter. Also, I loved that he highlighted the amount of invented terminology in therapeutic situations. I touched on a few ("process", trigger", "deflection", "semantics", "the crazy" [on the right]), but he included so many.
Yet, overall, I actually think that my book is… better. Maybe I’m a little bit biased, but I think that my characters are more likeable and my plot is more realistic. Some of Ned’s major plot points seemed really absurd and contrived (along the lines of “The teen psych ward is being renovated, so OH LOOK, we’re going to stick a teenage boy in with the adult patients, even though that’s completely unrealistic.”), which I disliked. Also, his main character, Craig, was downright annoying. My Nate is not nearly as whiney.

So yes, I guess I’d recommend this book, but only if you don’t feel like waiting until I can publish mine. Because, essentially, my book is the same. (Except you won’t want to punch the main character.)

I read two other books this week, but I didn’t feel like writing about them right now. So, you shall see a new entry soon.

Also, I just want to say HELLO to the people subscribed to my blog. I warn you now that I'm extremely informal with this thing. I really only made it so that I could keep track of what I read and make myself think about the things a I read a little bit more. But hey, maybe I'll start working harder now that I feel as if I should try to impress you.

Total Book Count: 73
Total NonFic: 24 (32.8%)