Real-life plot twist: Novelist runs into burning home to save laptop

Avoiding a horrible real-life plot twist, a writer dashed past firefighters into his burning New Orleans house Thursday to rescue two completed novels stored on his laptop.

"Anybody that's ever created art, there's no replacing that," Gideon Hodge, 35, told The New Orleans Advocate after safely making it out of the burning building with the computer. "It's got pretty much my life's work."

Hodge, who describes himself as a playwright, novelist and actor, told the Advocate that he didn't hesitate before running in. "Despite my better sense, I just ran inside and grabbed it. I didn't think to be scared."

His computer was intact, Hodge said, having been sheltered by a table from water being used to douse the fire.

The fire in New Orleans' Broadmoor neighborhood had spread to the house where Hodge lived from an empty, single-family house next door. It took 67 firefighters more than two hours to subdue the three-alarm blaze. A huge column of black smoke was visible for miles, but no injuries were reported.

Hodge's home, along with his family's belongings, was destroyed. His friends responded by setting up a GoFundMe page that's already raised almost $6,000 in less than 24 hours.

Hodge posted a message of gratitude on his Facebook page late last night: "I thank you all for the outpouring of love that came forth during all of this...You have been more help than I could have imagined."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.