Pages to Screen
The holidays are over and hopefully you made it through without catching the pesky cold or flu. I quarantined myself to the couch this weekend and ended up resting and binge watching The Handmaid’s Tale. on Hulu. I found it to be quite compelling and fought through the Nyquil to keep watching. If you haven’t read Margaret Atwood’s book or watched the television series, I highly recommend both. Personally, I like to read before viewing.
This got me thinking about film adaptations coming out in 2018. In a quick perusal of upcoming films, I discovered that the movie blurbs are always much more succinct than book descriptions. Movie descriptions are usually limited to one sentence, whereas book blurbs can be up to 3 paragraphs. For this compare and contrast, I’ve provided the blurbs listed on IMDb as well as the book blurbs a listed on Goodreads.com so you can see the difference in how they are described for both the book and film. These films haven’t been released as of yet so I can’t comment if they stayed true to the novels that inspired them.
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
You’ll like this book/movie if you like: video games, 80s pop culture, dystopian future, good vs. evil stories,
Movie Blurb from IMDb: When the creator of a virtual reality world called the OASIS dies, he releases a video in which he challenges all OASIS users to find his Easter Egg, which will give the finder his fortune. Wade Watts finds the first clue and starts a race for the Egg.
Release date is 3/30/2018
Book blurb from Goodreads: In the year 2044, reality is an ugly place. The only time teenage Wade Watts really feels alive is when he’s jacked into the virtual utopia known as the OASIS. Wade’s devoted his life to studying the puzzles hidden within this world’s digital confines, puzzles that are based on their creator’s obsession with the pop culture of decades past and that promise massive power and fortune to whoever can unlock them. When Wade stumbles upon the first clue, he finds himself beset by players willing to kill to take this ultimate prize. The race is on, and if Wade’s going to survive, he’ll have to win—and confront the real world he’s always been so desperate to escape.
Where’d You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple
You’ll like this book/movie if you like: Mother/daughter stories, quirky characters, rotating point of view, small town antics.
Movie Blurb from IMDb: After her anxiety-ridden mother disappears, 15-year-old Bee does everything she can to track her down, discovering her troubled past in the process.
Release date is 5/11/2018
Book Blurb from Goodreads: Bernadette Fox is notorious. To her Microsoft-guru husband, she’s a fearlessly opinionated partner; to fellow private-school mothers in Seattle, she’s a disgrace; to design mavens, she’s a revolutionary architect, and to 15-year-old Bee, she is a best friend and, simply, Mom.
Then Bernadette disappears. It began when Bee aced her report card and claimed her promised reward: a family trip to Antarctica. But Bernadette’s intensifying allergy to Seattle – and people in general – has made her so agoraphobic that a virtual assistant in India now runs her most basic errands. A trip to the end of the earth is problematic.
To find her mother, Bee compiles email messages, official documents, secret correspondence – creating a compulsively readable and touching novel about misplaced genius and a mother and daughter’s role in an absurd world.
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
You’ll like this book/movie if you like: science fiction, adventure, good vs. evil, coming of age stories
Movie Blurb from IMDb: After the disappearance of her scientist father, three peculiar beings send Meg, her brother, and her friend to space in order to find him.
Release date is March 9, 2018
Book Blurb from Goodreads: It was a dark and stormy night; Meg Murry, her small brother Charles Wallace, and her mother had come down to the kitchen for a midnight snack when they were upset by the arrival of a most disturbing stranger.
“Wild nights are my glory,” the unearthly stranger told them. “I just got caught in a downdraft and blown off course. Let me be on my way. Speaking of way, by the way, there is such a thing as a tesseract”.
Meg’s father had been experimenting with this fifth dimension of time travel when he mysteriously disappeared. Now the time has come for Meg, her friend Calvin, and Charles Wallace to rescue him. But can they outwit the forces of evil they will encounter on their heart-stopping journey through space?
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows
You’ll like this book/movie if you like: Books about books, historical fiction, post-world war II
Movie Blurb from IMDb: A writer forms an unexpected bond with the residents of Guernsey Island in the aftermath of World War II when she decides to write a book about their experiences during the war.
Release date is April 19, 2018
Book Blurb from Goodreads: January 1946: London is emerging from the shadow of the Second World War, and writer Juliet Ashton is looking for her next book subject. Who could imagine that she would find it in a letter from a man she’s never met, a native of the island of Guernsey, who has come across her name written inside a book by Charles Lamb….
As Juliet and her new correspondent exchange letters, Juliet is drawn into the world of this man and his friends—and what a wonderfully eccentric world it is. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society—born as a spur-of-the-moment alibi when its members were discovered breaking curfew by the Germans occupying their island—boasts a charming, funny, deeply human cast of characters, from pig farmers to phrenologists, literature lovers all.
Juliet begins a remarkable correspondence with the society’s members, learning about their island, their taste in books, and the impact the recent German occupation has had on their lives. Captivated by their stories, she sets sail for Guernsey, and what she finds will change her forever.
Written with warmth and humor as a series of letters, this novel is a celebration of the written word in all its guises, and of finding connection in the most surprising ways.
Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan
You’ll like this book/movie if you like: humorous antics, wedding stories, lifestyle blogs
Movie Blurb from IMDb: Three wealthy Chinese families prepare for the wedding of the year.
Release date is August 17, 2018
Book Blurb from Goodreads: When New Yorker Rachel Chu agrees to spend the summer in Singapore with her boyfriend, Nicholas Young, she envisions a humble family home and quality time with the man she hopes to marry. But Nick has failed to give his girlfriend a few key details. One, that his childhood home looks like a palace; two, that he grew up riding in more private planes than cars; and three, that he just happens to be the country’s most eligible bachelor.
On Nick’s arm, Rachel may as well have a target on her back the second she steps off the plane, and soon, her relaxed vacation turns into an obstacle course of old money, new money, nosy relatives, and scheming social climbers.
