I recently watched an excellent movie that most of you have most likely heard of called "I Am Legend". Yes I know it came out forever ago, I'm not up-to-date on my movie intake. In the end credits it states that the movie is based on a book by the same name, authored by Richard Matheson. I enjoyed the movie so of course I went to the library the next day and checked out the book. It was so little like the movie it was shocking. The only things really the same were the main characters name and that be believed himself the last man alive on earth. Well, that's not exactly true or fair. There are threads of similarities through out, but they are very, very thin.

SPOILER!!!
The movie is about Robert Neville, a doctor living in New York with his dog and trying to find a cure for a mutated virus that turned everyone into photosensitive monsters. In the end he finds he is not the last man alive as feared and manages to come up with a cure, dying in the end.

The book is about a average man Robert Neville, living in a small town alone. Everyone in the world has become vampires. His main goal is to stay alive and kill the beasts during the day while they sleep. In the story some of the vampires are dead and some alive (as in still breath, have pulse all that) The living vampires began a new society and Neville is killed for his crime of killing countless "living" vampires.

There's a lot more to both stories than just this and I highly recommend both the movie and the book. But here's my question . . .

Would you let some big production company buy the right to use your work and change it in almost every way? I'm not a published author, but I put a whole hell of a lot of effort into what I write. Would I knowingly hand that over to be mangled? The impulse answer is no. No way, not ever. But . . . I can imagine my kids in private school. I can see two savings accounts stuffed and ready for their college education. I like new cars and nice houses. I could get behind some huge actor or actress playing a character I wrote, even if it is an altered version. I want to say I never would. That my art is more important than any pay check. But . . .