I remembered shooting rockets made of coconut leaves off the rooftop terrace, and watching the beady-eyed green-and-yellow lizards that scuttled over the putty-colored walls after a hard rain. I remembered cold baths from a bucket with a plastic dipper, and sweet, oily badam halva from the nearby Chola hotel.

Oh, but by now you are tired of all this looking, and you want to reach your destination—your hotel, your room. You long to refresh yourself; you long to eat some nice lobster, some nice local food. You take a bath, you brush your teeth.

Opal Mehta:

I never thought I would say this, but I was worried about my parents. They had officially lost it.

We were never to trust each other. This was like a motto repeated to us by out parents...

You get the idea—it's a game for players of all ages! Whoever finds the next real plagiarism wins. Oh, schandafreunde chasing entitlement chasing schandafreunde: the gift that keeps on giving. —Jon

If you've been paying attention to Gawker this year, you should recognize most of the names on this list. (We've given you a little preview at right. We'd never leave the Tinz off our list!) They're the people who've distracted you, intrigued you, and sickened you (often all at the same time!) in 2006. If you've fallen behind, consider this our New Year's gift to you. We're feeling magnanimous.

Without further ado, the list of Gawker's Personalities of the Year, in no particular order, after the jump.

Hmm, from what possible recent scandal does that name ring a bell?

Because they had never applied to an American educational institution, they hired Katherine Cohen, founder of IvyWise, a private counseling service, and author of "Rock Hard Apps: How to Write the Killer College Application." At the time IvyWise charged $10,000 to $20,000 for two years of college preparation services, spread over a student's junior and senior years. But they did have limits. "I don't think she did our platinum package, which is now over $30,000," Ms. Cohen said of Ms. Viswanathan. Ms. Cohen helped open doors other than Harvard's. After reading some of Ms. Viswanathan's writing (she had completed a several-hundred-page novel about Irish history while in high school, naturally), Ms. Cohen put her in touch with the William Morris Agency, which represents Ms. Cohen. Jennifer Rudolph Walsh, who is now Ms. Viswanathan's agent, sold the novel that eventually became "Opal" to Little, Brown on the basis of four chapters and an outline as part of a two-book deal.

The Swarm of the College Super-Applicants [NYMag]
Kaavya Viswanathan's Chick-Lit Novel: How To Get into College By Really, Really Trying [NYT]
Earlier: Gawker's coverage of Kaavya Viswanathan

Earlier: Gawker's Coverage of Kaavya Viswanathan

Crimson Cartoonist's Work Bears Similarity to Others' [Harvard Crimson]

EXCLUSIVE: She's Baaaaack! Kaavya's First Post-Plagiarism Writing [IvyGate]

Kaavya Viswanathan ’08, embroiled in a plagariasm controversy over a novel last spring, was appointed a freshman peer adviser before that news broke; she will apparently serve in a capacity not involving direct advising.

Keeping Kaavya away the little ones — it's part of Harvard's freshman outreach program.

Brevia [Harvard Magazine]
Earlier: Gawker's Coverage of Kaavya

She's reviewing a book by an organization to which she belongs and the best she can do is "truly a strength network for women?" Jesus. Maybe we'd all be better off if we just let her plagiarize and looked the other way.

More Than 85 Broads review [Amazon]

Earlier: Gawker's coverage of Kaavya Viswanathan

85 Broads interns Alexa Von Tobel, Kaayva Viswanathan, Danielle Synder, and Monique Yashaya from Harvard, Vanderbilt, and Princeton are flying to Nairobi and Lwala, Kenya to shoot a documentary aimed at raising awareness of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Africa.

Can it be? Is notorious plagiarist Kaavya Viswanathan really heading to Africa? How might that continent inspire her creative talents? After the jump, we've got an exclusive: a new Kaavya short story.

THE MARVELLOUS THING IS THAT IT'S painless," she said. "That's how you know when it starts."

"Is it really?"

"Absolutely. I'm awfully sorry about the odor though. That must bother you."

"Don't! Please don't."

"Look at them," she said. "Now is it sight or is it scent that brings them like that?"

The cot the woman lay on was in the wide shade of a mimosa tree and as she looked out past the shade onto the glare of the plain there were three of the big birds squatted obscenely, while in the sky a dozen more sailed, making quick-moving shadows as they passed.

"They've been there since the day the truck broke down," she said. "Today's the first time any have lit on the ground. I watched the way they sailed very carefully at first in case I ever wanted to use them in a story. That's funny now."

"I wish you wouldn't," he said.

"I'm only talking," she said. "It's much easier if I talk. But I don't want to bother you."

"You know it doesn't bother me," he said. "It's that I've gotten so very nervous not being able to do anything. I think we might make it as easy as we can until the plane comes."

"Or until the plane doesn't come."

"I'm only talking," he said. "It's much easier if I talk. But I don't want to bother you."

"Please tell me what I can do. There must be something I can do."

"You can take the leg off and that might stop it, though I doubt it. Or you can shoot me. You're a good shot now. I taught you to shoot, didn't I?"

"Please don't talk that way. Couldn't I read to you?"

"Read what?"

"Anything in the book that we haven't read."

"I can't listen to it," she said." Talking is the easiest. We quarrel and that makes the time pass."

"What about a drink?"

"It's supposed to be bad for you. It said in Black's to avoid all alcohol.You shouldn't drink."

"Molo!" she shouted.

"Yes Bwana."

"Bring whiskey-soda."

"Yes Bwana."

"You shouldn't," he said. "That's what I mean by giving up. It says it's bad for you. I know it's bad for you."

"No," she said. "It's good for me."

So now it was all over, she thought. So now she would never have a chance to finish it. So this was the way it ended, in a bickering over a drink. Since the gangrene started in her right leg he had no pain and with the pain the horror had gone and all she felt now was a great tiredness and anger that this was the end of it. For this, that now was coming, she had very little curiosity.

For years it had obsessed her; but now it meant nothing in itself. It was strange how easy being tired enough made it.

Now she would never copy the things that he had saved to copy until she knew enough to copy them well. Well, she would not have to fail at trying to copy them either. Maybe you could never copy them, and that was why you put them off and delayed the starting. Well she would never know, now.

Then he called out to her.

There was no answer and he could not hear her breathing.

Outside the tent the hyena made the same strange noise that had awakened him. But he did not hear him for the beating of his heart.

85 Broads [85 Broads]

CHILDREN'S: YOUNG ADULT
Jamie Michaels's KISS MY BOOK, story of a teen writing sensation who gets caught plagiarizing her debut novel, but finds redemption and romance when she escapes to a small town, to Krista Marino at Delacorte, by Michael Bourret at Dystel & Goderich Literary Management (World).

Surely DreamWorks is considering optioning this, if only to get back at Viswanathan for screwing them over the first time. No studio exec is above exacting revenge on a teenager. Now, does anyone know who reps that Bend It Like Beckham girl?

Earlier: Gawker's Coverage of Kaavya

The passage that Viswanathan chose just happened to be one of her cribbed bits containing language taken from The Princess Diaries. Specifically, she read aloud, "Every inch of me had been cut, filed, steamed, exfoliated, polished, painted, or moisturized. I didn't look a thing like Opal Mehta..." (The Diaries passage reads, "There isn't a single inch of me that hasn't been pinched, cut, filed, painted, sloughed, blown dry, or moisturized. [...] Because I don't look a thing like Mia Thermopolis...") Who knew morning A&E was full of such high comedy?

A reader reports on the interview:

BWA:...the youngest to ever be assigned to a two-book deal for half a million dollars. True or false?
Kaavya: [stupid smirk] No comment.

BWA: Do you want to go into writing, you think?
K: I think eventually, I'd love to go into writing, but I don't really see writing as a full time job for me. It's something that I would do no matter what I was also working at in my day to day career. So I think why not have both?

BWA: How did you actually find the time to write this book?
K: It was a huge time commitment!

Earlier: Gawker's Coverage of Kaavya Viswanathan

We won't bother with all 79 plagiarized passages (do go see for yourself), but here's a start:

The Parlourmaid's Tale, or, MS in a Dustbin
by Bonnie Furlong

Sorry for the plagiarism, but there seemed no other way.¹

Dear Macmillan:²

What I want is³ a suave and worldly editor⁴ who can puff away dusty speculation to reveal stark, cold, obsidian and alabaster truth.⁵ The story between these covers is the second I have resuscitated from the bottom of a tin trunk that I received anonymously some years ago.⁶ These literally are manuscripts, handwritten on⁷ flyleaves of books, match folders, old letters⁸ — rather hastily written and much damaged.⁹ The validity of this very ancient account is almost totally dubious,¹⁰ but it's absolute dynamite.¹¹ A careful reading, I beg of you, a careful reading in private, careful editing, and then find a typist.¹²

The odd array of footnotes after the jump.

¹Davies, Robertson. High Spirits: A Collection of Ghost Stories. New York: Penguin Books, 1982. Page 33.

²Nowell-Smith, Simon. Letters to Macmillan. Ed. New York: Macmillan, 1967. Page 40.

³Thurber, James. The Years With Ross. Boston, Toronto: Little, Brown and Company, 1959. Page 5.

⁴Thurber, James. The Years With Ross. Boston, Toronto: Little, Brown and Company, 1959. Page 123.

⁵Phillips, Arthur. The Egyptologist. New York: Random House, 2004. Page 5.

⁶King, Laurie R. A Monstrous Regiment of Women. New York: Bantam Books, 1997. Page: Editor's preface.

⁷King, Laurie R. A Monstrous Regiment of Women. New York: Bantam Books, 1997. Page: Editor's preface.

⁸Rogers, Ann. The New Cookbook for Poor Poets and Others. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1979. Page 7.

⁹Tolkien, J.R.R. The Fellowship of the Ring. New York: Ballantine Books, 1965. Page 418.

¹⁰McKee, Richard. The Clan of the Flapdragon and Other Adventures in Etymology by B.M.W. Schrapnel, Ph.D. Tuscaloosa and London: The University of Alabama Press, 1997. Page 14.

¹¹Nowell-Smith, Simon. Letters to Macmillan. Ed. New York: Macmillan, 1967. Page 349.

¹²Phillips, Arthur. The Egyptologist. New York: Random House, 2004. Page 6.

Sloppy Seconds With Opal Mehta Contest [TMN]
Earlier: You Know You're a Better Cheat Than Kaavya

I saw her at a cinco de mayo party at 44 jfk on friday night. My friend was a little drunk and was shouting about Salman Rushdie. She did not look pleased. Another friend later found her in a more secluded room smoking and told her that "smoking kills."

Oh, come on! Leave the poor girl alone. Smoking and drinking are the only ways she can numb the pain — that is, until she gets hooked on H.

Earlier: Gawker's Unrelenting Coverage of Kaavya Viswanathan

"To me, all that stuff is such a black box," said one author who has worked with the company. "They have writers who don't exist, and they have writers who don't really write the stuff, and they have one series supposedly by one author that are by many. There's no one-to-one alignment between anything that gets produced and the producer. There's no literary accountability."

Maybe it's just us, but that's fucking awful. How is this company even allowed to exist? Can you imagine spending your bookworm youth idolizing Ann M. Martin, only to find out that she probably never laid a finger on the first Baby-Sitters Club Super Special? Heartbreaking.

Viswanathan-athon: Plagiarizing Writer Fell in Weird Alloy [NYO]

This won't fit on the Gawker Stalker map, but I just literally ran into Kaava Viswanathan in Harvard's Barker Center. She was walking and speaking with an elderly English professor. After a predictably brief examination of conscience, I stopped dead in my tracks and shamlessly eavesdropped on the conversation. She seemed understandably shaken, even on the verge of tears. An interesting tidbit though. She explained to the prof how for the first 4 months of the writing process, she "hated Opal" and that the "writing never came naturally" to her. Apparently, she didn't even like the book she so blatantly resorted to plagiarism to create!

Well, that's a rock-solid excuse if we've ever heard one. Have a heart, Harvard!

Earlier: Gawker's Coverage of Kaavya Viswanathan

Not unexpectedly, the second book under Viswanathan's contract will not be published. As for her reported $500,000 advance, there's a chance Viswanathan could be asked to return the money — plagiarism is technically a breach of contract. For her sake, we hope she didn't already spend the cash on those flashy rims she's been wanting.

Meanwhile, the author's classmates refuse to let up on the scrutiny: today they've concluded that she's also ripped passages from a similar novel called Born Confused. So that puts Kaavya at possibly plagiarizing six different titles — if she would just take a second to add some citations, she could totally win the Morning News contest.

[Ed: No, we will not stop using this picture of her. It's too perfect.]

No Encore for Opal [Publishers Weekly]
Yet More Suspicious Passages Found in Kaavya's Opal Mehta [Harvard Independent]

The prevalent way of pronouncing her name around these parts seems to be KAHV-yuh VISH-wah-NAH-thon, with the strongest emphasis in the last name on the first syllable, if that makes sense. People were using all sorts of random pronunciations when the story first broke, but that's what's been settled on after consultation with various Indian-American kids.

And no doubt they cribbed the answer from some slightly older Irish chick.

Earlier: Gawker's coverage of Kaavya Viswanathan.

The deal with Little Brown was for a two book series. So have you started work on the sequel?
No. I haven't and I probably should. But I'm actually terrified about the writing process this time around. What if I find out I have nothing to say? What if I can't write? I just wish I could just move forward to the time when the sequel would be written and I could go around promoting it. I enjoy that part. (smiles)

Yes, Kaavya, the writing is the tough part, ain't it now?

A Fairy Tale Debut [The Hindu]

...I am told I showed up at 4 Times Square emaciated, wearing a page-boyish wig, dark red lipstick (not my shade), sunglasses and was ordering the staff around. When they wouldn't let me past security, I muttered between clenched teeth, "Do you know who I am? How dare you! Call Si immediately!" Instead they called the police.

Satire? Laurel, honey, that could be totally true.

Our Publisher Is Not Herself Today [Galleycat]

While the plagiarizing of Kinsella's work is hardly as blatant as that of McCafferty's, there are still instances of identical phrasing and passages in Opal. Most of the examples are very small, but relatively obvious:

Kinsella: "In a full-scale argument about animal rights," one character says, "The mink like being made into coats."
Viswanathan: In a "a full-fledged debate over animal rights," one character says, "The foxes want to be made into scarves."

Interestingly, all the Kinsella-copying is conveniently clustered towards the latter 1/3 of the book — that's likely the point at which Viswanathan ran out of McCafferty's steam and had to steal some new inspiration.

A Second Ripple in Plagiarism Scandal [NYT]
Earlier: Gawker's Coverage of Kaavya Viswanathan

Thus the Morning News wonders not why people turn to plagiarizing (because real work is hard, of course), but "why aren't people better at plagiarizing?" An excellent question — if all one is doing is passing off another's words as one's own, you'd think the ease of such a task would provide ample room for the plagiarizer to acheive excellence in his or her method. And yet, we get stuck with Viswanathans who publish slapdash cut and paste jobs.

Inspired by the need for quality plagiarism, the Morning News announces its "Sloppy Seconds With Opal Mehta" contest. This is not for the recreational copy-cat: using no less than five different books, your entry must total 750 words, none of which are your own. You may not plagiarize single words, but actual phrases, sentences, or passages, and all your material must be cited.

To remind them that this was "the moment ethics in writing died," winners will have their story published on TMN and will receive a TMN mug, t-shirt, and a $500,000 two-book deal.

Steal This Book, and That Book, and That Book [TMN]

In her first statement on the situation, McCafferty said, "I wish to inform all of the parties involved that I am not seeking restitution in any form. [...] I look forward to getting back to work and moving on, and hope Ms. Viswanathan can, too."

Ha, right. We don't really see Viswanathan moving on to much of anything after this, other than the inevitable memoir of how she fell into such a deep shithole at such a young age (our advice to KV: just blame drugs and depression, it makes for a better read). As for Kaavya's pricey education, we know what Harvard should do, but will it actually happen?

Gawker Media polls require Javascript; if you're viewing this in an RSS reader, click through to view in your Javascript-enabled web browser.

Publisher to Recall Harvard Student's Novel [NYT]

All in all, excellent preparation for your "hard newswoman" role at CBS, Katie. Practice makes perfect!

Earlier: Gawker's Coverage of Kaavya Viswanathan

A tipster tells that a few months ago, they received an advance reader's copy of Kaavya Viswanathan's debut novel, complete with fancy metallic embossing and a bound letter from Little, Brown publisher Michael Pietsch. His adoration of Viswanathan practically drips from every word — it's kind of sad, actually. Should there ever be a Museum of Fake Writers, may this powerful relic best preserve the memory of Fake Writer Day's youngest victim.

Earlier: Gawker's Coverage of Kaavya Viswanathan

Gawker Intern Neel Shah thinks he understands. Hailing from picturesque Port Jefferson, Long Island, Neel is a first generation Indian-American who took the SATs in 7th grade, went to the same dorky summer program at Johns Hopkins as Viswanathan, and recently graduated from Dartmouth. His father is a doctor, his family drives a Range Rover, and he played tennis in high school. In some small way, Neel knows where Kaavya's coming from. His culturally specific analysis of her hell and humiliation follows.

Whatever dubious subcontinental wunderkind Kaavya Viswanathan did write, didn't write, had ghost-written, cribbed, subconsciously borrowed, telepathically stole, or else was brainwashed into doing by a bunch of Pakistanis hell-bent on subverting India's credibility in the burgeoning Southeast Asian chick-lit genre, at least one thing is clear: shit like this is the reason brown kids should stick to quantitative math and organic chemistry. Ms. Viswanathan, after all, had all the hallmarks of future i-banker or doctor. Namely:

1. She was Indian (duh).
2. She had typical suburban "Indian" parents — that is, they were highly educated (both doctors), hyper-concerned with micromanaging every aspect of their progeny's education (they spent half a year's tuition to essentially buy their daughter admission to a school deemed "socially acceptable" by the other parent doctors and engineers of the Indian community at large), and owners of a large, drastically overpriced S.U.V. (the rear windshield of which provides optimal placement for a "socially acceptable" college decal used to ramp up envy in the aforementioned parent doctors and engineers of the Indian community at large).
3. She knew what she wanted at a ridiculously early age (a career in finance).

Had she stayed the course that was essentially her birthright, Ms. Viswanathan would've been crunching numbers for a top-bulge bracket bank in no time. Perhaps not by way of Harvard, but at least via Brown or Penn...certainly not — gasp! — state school.

But Brown and Penn aren't Harvard, and for some kids with an innate masochistic streak, Opal Mehta-esque parents who've spent the GDP of a small African nation on SAT prep classes, or have some combination of the both, it's Harvard or bust. And then you have absurdly compensated college counselors (who have to answer to some pretty pissed-off parents if they don't deliver the goods) saying, "You know, having a book deal will look grrreat on the 'extracurricular activities' portion of your Harvard app;" and you have bottom-line-driven book publishers saying, "You know, signing a 17-year old kid to a half a million dollar deal will provide grrreat buzz in a overcrowded but highly lucrative genre; let's worry about whether or not she can actually write later;" and you have overbearing parents saying, "You know, you've had every competitive advantage in life; we won't be mad if you don't get into Harvard, but you should really try your hardest — this book thing looks like a really good opportunity." And now, somewhere in this tangled mess of nerd-camp entitlement (see also: fellow Crimson alum Sylvester, Nick) and shady book packagers, you have a Harvard sophomore who looks to be proper fucked.

But hey, Kaavya: if nothing else, this will totally make killer fodder for a story on redemption and life lessons learned for your med school application essays.

And if Opal Mehta ever seemed uncomfortable with alcohol and partying, Viswanathan seems like she's got it pretty well under control: part of her Facebook "about me" reads "Wednesdays are the new Saturdays," and one of her listed interests is "morning-after calls with Lauren."

Seriously, that third keg stand just ruined any chance she had of getting Chapter 3 to her editor on time.

Booking the Real Thing [Crimson Mag]
Facebook

So let's assume, perhaps rightly, that Viswanathan isn't quite so gifted as a writer, despite her $500,000 book deal. What's her publisher (Little, Brown) and packager (17th Street Productions) to do? Consider the purpose of a packager: Simply put, they package a title for commercial viability. One theory is that the packager, in an attempt to help Viswanathan suck a little less, put together a guideline for Viswanathan that featured passages from McCafferty's novels. Another theory is that 17th Street, which quite possibly employs ghostwriters, hired a ghostwriter for Viswanathan that may have also worked with McCafferty and lifted passages on purpose ("to subvert the system" says a friend of Maud Newton's, though we don't quite think anyone's that punk rock these days).

Whatever happened here, let's just sum it all up with the obvious: Isn't it kind of awesome to see an overacheiving Indian kid finally do something wrong?

Earlier: Gawker's Coverage of Kaavya Viswanathan

While the central stories of my book and hers are completely different, I wasn't aware of how much I may have internalized Ms. McCafferty's words. I am a huge fan of her work and can honestly say that any phrasing similarities between her works and mine were completely unintentional and unconscious. My publisher and I plan to revise my novel for future printings to eliminate any inappropriate similarities.

I sincerely apologize to Megan McCafferty and to any who feel they have been misled by these unintentional errors on my part.

Oh, poor young Kaavya. These things do happen. It's just that t