Yup. You read that right. Every single idea that you can come up with has already been done. It might be a famous project, or an infamous project, or you might never have heard of it. But rest assured, it’s been done. But should this stop you? Absolutely not. I have written about my own experiences with this before.
I had decided to write a depressing mermaid story, and then Melissa Broder published the phenomenal The Pisces. I decided to write about reborn dolls, and apparently apple made a TV show on a similar premise. I wrote a 1950s lesbian story involving a Hollywood Film Star (the novel I am currently querying!), and the inimitatable Taylor Jenkins Reid published The Seven Husbans of Evelyn Hugo. But while my stories are loosely based on similar premises to these, I know that my story will be uniquely my own. A lot of the time we hear “there’s already a story like that” and we shut down and stop writing. Do you know that a reading of both of the above mentioned novels shows me I have NOTHING to fear? Our stories are only similar on the surface. Do you know as well that from first draft to third draft, my WIP has changed drastically? There is no reason to stop writing your piece. To give up. To tell yourself no. TELL YOURSELF YES! Write the stories in your heart and your gut. Only you can say what you need to say.
