: Re: How to write a book based in many different books? I'm writing a book about the different stories from religions that existed in my country some centuries ago. In order to learn more about

@Kevin153

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It depends on if your plan is to do a reprint of the originals under one cover, or if your plan is to retell the stories in your own words.
If it's a reprint, you'll need to either enter into a contract with the rights' holder (usually the original author or the original publisher) or establish that the work is no longer under copyright protection in your country (generally if the writer has been dead for over 70 years, in the United States) for each individual work. If you are going through a traditional publisher they may be able to do this for you, but you'll need to let them know up front that rights have not been secured (which may scare them off).
If you are doing retelling AND the story itself is originally from the folk tradition OR from an older story that is out of copyright, then make sure your version isn't too close a match to anyone else's, and list your sources in a bibliography. If at all possible, you'll want to base your versions on more than one source in this case.
I don't see either of these paths as unethical, or harmful to other writers. In the one case (reprints), you will be getting permissions first, and likely making payments or assigning a percentage of the royalties to the original author. In the other (retelling) you would be working from stories that already belong to everyone.
The only real questionable area would be if you wanted to do a new retelling of someone's original story that is still under copyright. I'm not sure what the legalities of that are, but I would imagine they are similar to if you were doing a reprint. I wouldn't personally do it unless I got written permissions first.

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