All of our sexual desires are inherited from someone else . All of our physical traits are inherited from someone else . All of our science is built on the work of someone else . All of our technology is stolen from aliens . Oops . Shouldn ' t have said that . This is why ideas cannot be copyrighted or patented . You have to reduce the idea to practice build the thing to get a patent . You have to write the story to get it copyrighted . And , no two writers write exactly the same . Hunger Games is a great example of this fact . Dystopian future ? Done already . Chicklet heroine ? Yeah , done already . Love triangle ? Done . Crushing poverty ? Done . Charismatic , evil President ? Done . So why didn ' t The Hunger Games fall on its ass and die a rapid death ? Now that ' s an interesting question . The cheap answer is originality is overrated . The people most worried about it are new writers , and if anyone needs a leg up by using some existing plot points , it ' s new writers . How ironic , eh ? The longer answer is more interesting . I can restate you second assertion like this and I think it will be more useful Every idea is a result of something we are aware of . Our awareness is the limit of our imagination , not what we ' ve read or not read . I read an interview with Suzanne Collins , the author of The Hunger Games . She said she came up with the idea when she watched some absurd reality TV show and then scenes from the Iraq war , and started to wonder to what extremes she could take that idea . There were classical Greek influences as well . The Hunger Games succeeded in large part by being a familiar story told in a new and relevant way . Theseus and the Minotaur combined with reality TV . Just to put this into some perspective , The Hunger Games trilogy only sold 65 million copies in the US . Huh ? Whatchu mean ' only ' homie ? That ' s a small forest sacrificed to district 12 . Au contraire , mes ami . What this means is another 200 million people didn ' t bother . What that means for new writers is Don ' t get down on your prospects of selling your books . Once you know how to write good enough and compose a compelling story , you can sell 300 , 000 copies and no one but you will notice . That ' s a lie . A lot will notice because they ' ll be asking you why you ' re screaming .