A continuator, in literature, is a writer who creates a new work based on someone else's prior text, such as a novel or novel fragment. The new work may complete the older work (as with the numerous continuations of Jane Austen's unfinished novel Sanditon), or may try to serve as a sequel or prequel to the older work (such as Alexandra Ripley's Scarlett, an authorized continuation of Margaret Mitchell's Gone with the Wind). This phenomenon differs from those authors who, because they share a common culture, use characters or themes from a common cultural stock.