From Page to Screen: Fall 2024

Adaptations of your favorite books and spooky stories are hitting the streaming services this fall! Fall releases include new takes on beloved spooky stories such as Rosemary’s Baby and Salem’s Lot. Looking for more of a non-fiction feel? This fall’s adaptations will take you from life on Navajo land to the battlefield of World War II.

If you want to compare and contrast or just love a good spoiler, pick up the book to read before you start watching! Click on the book title to request a print copy of the book, or check out Libby or Hoopla for eBook or eAudiobook offerings.

Rosemary’s Baby by Ira Levin

Rosemary Woodhouse and her struggling actor husband Guy move into the Bramford, an old New York City apartment building with an ominous reputation and mostly elderly residents. Neighbors Roman and Minnie Castavet soon come nosing around to welcome the Woodhouses to the building, and despite Rosemary’s reservations about their eccentricity and the weird noises that she keeps hearing, her husband takes a special shine to them. Shortly after Guy lands a plum Broadway role, Rosemary becomes pregnant, and the Castavets start taking a special interest in her welfare. As the sickened Rosemary becomes increasingly isolated, she begins to suspect that the Castavets’ circle is not what it seems . . .

Streaming on Paramount +.

The Lives of Lee Miller by Antony Penrose

Starting in 1927 in New York, this volume chronicles Lee Miller as she is discovered as a model by Condé Nast, hits the cover of Vogue, and is immortalized by Edward Steichen, George Hoyningen-Huene, Horst P. Horst, and other acclaimed photographers. From there, readers follow Miller to Paris where she, along with Man Ray, invented the solarization technique of photography, and where she developed into a brilliant Surrealist photographer. Finally, this account covers the later chapters of her life, when she became a war correspondent during World WarII, traveling with the Allied armies to cover the siege of Saint-Malo and the liberation of Paris, which lead to her photographs of the Dachau concentration camp that shocked the world.

Coming to theaters.

Canyon Dreams: A Basketball Season on the Navajo Nation by Michael Powell

Deep in the heart of northern Arizona, in a small and isolated patch of the vast 17.5-million-acre Navajo reservation, sits Chinle High School. Here, basketball is passion, passed from grandparent to parent to child. Rez Ball is a sport for winters where dark and cold descend fast and there is little else to do but roam mesa tops, work, and wonder what the future holds. The town has 4,500 residents and the high school arena seats 7,000. Fans drive thirty, fifty, even eighty miles to see the fast-paced and highly competitive matchups that are more than just games to players and fans.

Streaming on Netflix.

Salem’s Lot by Stephen King

When two young boys venture into the woods, and only one returns alive, Mears begins to realize that something sinister is at work. In fact, his hometown is under siege from forces of darkness far beyond his imagination. And only he, with a small group of allies, can hope to contain the evil that is growing within the borders of this small New England town.

Streaming on Max.

Wicked by Gregory Maguire

Years before Dorothy and her dog crash-land, another little girl makes her presence known in Oz. This girl, Elphaba, is born with emerald-green skin–no easy burden in a land as mean and poor as Oz, where superstition and magic are not strong enough to explain or overcome the natural disasters of flood and famine. Still, Elphaba is smart, and by the time she enters Shiz University, she becomes a member of a charmed circle of Oz’s most promising young citizens.

Coming to theaters.

The Day of the Jackal by Frederick Forsyth

The Jackal. A tall, blond Englishman with opaque, gray eyes. A killer at the top of his profession. A man unknown to any secret service in the world. An assassin with a contract to kill the world’s most heavily guarded man. One man with a rifle who can change the course of history. One man whose mission is so secretive not even his employers know his name. And as the minutes count down to the final act of execution, it seems that there is no power on earth that can stop the Jackal.

Coming to Peacock.

-Happy reading!

Melinda

From Page to Screen: Spring 2024

This spring’s book to film adaptations are hitting the streaming services all season long! These limited run series take your favorite blockbuster books and turn them into six or seven episode arcs, building out the world of beloved characters from Patricia Highsmith’s Ripley to Liane Moriarty’s family of tennis pros.

If you want to compare and contrast or just love a good spoiler, pick up the book to read before you start watching! Click on the book title to request a print copy of the book, or check out Libby or Hoopla for eBook or eAudiobook offerings.

Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty

If your mother was missing, would you tell the police? Even if the most obvious suspect was your father?This is the dilemma facing the four grown Delaney siblings. The Delaneys are fixtures in their community. The parents, Stan and Joy, are the envy of all of their friends. They’re killers on the tennis court, and off it their chemistry is palpable. But after fifty years of marriage, they’ve finally sold their famed tennis academy and are ready to start what should be the golden years of their lives. So why are Stan and Joy so miserable?

Streaming on Peacock.

Dark Matter by Blake Crouch

“Are you happy with your life?” Those are the last words Jason Dessen hears before the kidnapper knocks him unconscious. Before he awakens to find himself strapped to a gurney, surrounded by strangers in hazmat suits. Before a man he’s never met smiles down at him and says, “Welcome back, my friend.” In this world he’s woken up to, Jason’s life is not the one he knows. His wife is not his wife. His son was never born. And Jason is not an ordinary college professor but a celebrated genius who has achieved something remarkable. Something impossible.

Coming to AppleTV+ on May 8.

We Were the Lucky Ones by Georgia Hunter

It is the spring of 1939 and three generations of the Kurc family are doing their best to live normal lives, even as the shadow of war grows closer. The talk around the family Seder table is of new babies and budding romance, not of the increasing hardships threatening Jews in their hometown of Radom, Poland. But soon the horrors overtaking Europe will become inescapable and the Kurcs will be flung to the far corners of the world, each desperately trying to navigate his or her own path to safety.

Streaming on Hulu.

The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen

The Sympathizer is a sweeping epic of love and betrayal. The narrator, a communist double agent, is a “man of two minds,” a half-French, half-Vietnamese army captain who arranges to come to America after the Fall of Saigon, and while building a new life with other Vietnamese refugees in Los Angeles is secretly reporting back to his communist superiors in Vietnam. 

Streaming on Max.

Under the Bridge by Rebecca Godfrey

In this “tour de force of crime reportage”, acclaimed author Rebecca Godfrey takes us into the hidden world of the seven teenage girls–and boy–accused of a savage murder. As she follows the investigation and trials, Godfrey reveals the startling truth about the unlikely killers. 

Streaming on Hulu.

The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris

In April 1942, Lale Sokolov, a Slovakian Jew, is forcibly transported to the concentration camps at Auschwitz-Birkenau. When his captors discover that he speaks several languages, he is put to work as a Tätowierer (the German word for tattooist), tasked with permanently marking his fellow prisoners. Imprisoned for over two and a half years, Lale witnesses horrific atrocities and barbarism–but also incredible acts of bravery and compassion. 

Coming to Peacock on May 2.

The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith

Newly arrived in the heady world of Manhattan, Ripley meets a wealthy industrialist who hires him to bring his playboy son, Dickie Greenleaf, back from gallivanting in Italy. Soon Ripley’s fascination with Dickie’s debonair lifestyle turns obsessive as he finds himself enraged by Dickie’s ambivalent affections for Marge, a charming American dilettante, and Ripley begins a deadly game.

Streaming on Netflix.

-Happy reading!

Melinda

From Page to Screen: Award Season

Photo by Engin Akyurt: https://www.pexels.com/photo/standing-man-figurine-2098604/

And the Oscar goes too…the books behind the movies. Award season kicked off with the Golden Globes on January 7, with book to film adaptations well represented among the nominees and winners! The Oscars take place on March 10, so there’s plenty of time to pick up a book before the awards ceremony. Here’s what books are buzzing this awards season.

Oppenheimer, nominated for thirteen Academy Awards and based on

American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin

J. Robert Oppenheimer is one of the iconic figures of the twentieth century, a physicist who led the effort to build the atomic bomb for his country in a time of war, and who later found himself confronting the moral consequences of scientific progress.

Request the book here.

Killers of the Flower Moon, nominated for ten Academy Awards and based on

Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann

Presents a true account of the early twentieth-century murders of dozens of wealthy Osage and law-enforcement officials, citing the contributions and missteps of a fledgling FBI that eventually uncovered one of the most chilling conspiracies in American history. 

Request the book here.

Poor Things, nominated for eleven Academy Awards and based on

Poor Things by Alasdair Gray

Supposedly the product of the fiendish scientist Godwin Baxter, Bella was resurrected for the sole purpose of fulfilling the whims of her benefactor.

Request the book here.

American Fiction, nominated for five Academy Awards and based on 

Erasure by Percival Everett

Thelonius “Monk” Ellison is an erudite, accomplished but seldom-read author who insists on writing obscure literary papers rather than the so-called “ghetto prose” that would make him a commercial success.

Request the book here.

Nyad, nominated for two Academy Awards and based on

Find a Way: The Inspiring Story of One Woman’s Pursuit of a Lifelong Dream by Diana Nyad

On September 2, 2013, at the age of 64, Diana Nyad emerged onto the shores of Key West after completing a 110 mile, 53 hour, record-breaking swim through shark-infested waters from Cuba to Florida

Request the book here.

The Color Purple, nominated for an Academy Award and based on

The Color Purple by Alice Walker

Separated as girls, sisters Celie and Nettie sustain their loyalty to and hope in each other across time, distance, and silence.

Request the book here.

The Zone of Interest, nominated for five Academy Awards and based on

The Zone of Interest by Martin Amis

A fictionalized look at the Holocaust told from the human perspective of four different characters: Paul Doll, commandant of a concentration camp; his wife, Hannah Doll, who is far more aware of what is going on around her than her husband realizes; Angelus ‘Golo’ Thomsen, the privileged nephew of Hitler’s personal secretary who falls for Hannah; and Szmul, a Jewish prisoner who works at the camp and witnesses all of the atrocities that happen around him.  

Request the book here.

Enjoy these blockbuster reads!

-Melinda

From Page to Screen: Winter 2024

2024 is sure to bring another round of book to film adaptations, and we’re kicking off the year with a few flicks guaranteed to be blockbusters. Some of the films were set to open in Fall 2023 but were delayed due to the SAG-AFTRA strike.

Whether you’re a member of “The Book Was Better” club or enjoy the film version, there is something for everyone. If you want to compare and contrast or just love a good spoiler, pick up the book to read before you start watching!

January

Fool Me Once by Harlan Coben

Former special ops pilot Maya, home from the war, sees an unthinkable image captured by her nanny cam while she is at work: her two-year-old daughter playing with Maya’s husband, Joe, To find the answer, Maya must finally come to terms with deep secrets and deceit in her own past before she can face the unbelievable truth about her husband, and herself.  

Coming to Netflix on January 1.

The Expatriates by Janice Y.K. Lee

Three very different American women livie in the same small expat community in Hong Kong. Mercy, a young Korean American and recent Columbia graduate, is adrift, undone by a terrible incident in her recent past. Hilary, a wealthy housewife, is haunted by her struggle to have a child, something she believes could save her foundering marriage. Meanwhile, Margaret, once a happily married mother of three, questions her maternal identity in the wake of a shattering loss. Their lives collide in ways that have irreversible consequences for them all.  

Coming to Amazon Prime on January 26.

February

It Ends With Us by Colleen Hoover

Sometimes it is the one who loves you who hurts you the most. Lily hasn’t always had it easy, but that’s never stopped her from working hard for the life she wants. So when she feels a spark with a gorgeous neurosurgeon named Ryle Kincaid, everything in Lily’s life suddenly seems almost too good to be true. Ryle is assertive, stubborn, maybe even a little arrogant. He’s also sensitive, brilliant, and has a total soft spot for Lily. And the way he looks in scrubs certainly doesn’t hurt. Lily can’t get him out of her head.

Coming to theaters on February 9.

March

Dune by Frank Herbert

Set on the desert planet Arrakis, Dune is the story of Paul Atreides–who would become known as Muad’Dib–and of a great family’s ambition to bring to fruition mankind’s most ancient and unattainable dream.

Dune Part Two is coming to theaters on March 1.

Mickey7 by Edward Ashton

Dying isn’t any fun…but at least it’s a living. Mickey7 is an Expendable: a disposable employee on a human expedition sent to colonize the ice world Niflheim. Whenever there’s a mission that’s too dangerous-even suicidal-the crew turns to Mickey. After one iteration dies, a new body is regenerated with most of his memories intact.

Coming to theaters on March 29.

Happy reading!

-Melinda

From Page to Screen: Spring Releases

Spring has sprung, which means it’s time for another round of upcoming book to film adaptations. Literary adaptations are hitting the streaming services and theaters again!

The season is starting off with the NYT bestseller Daisy Jones & The Six, but thrills and romantic moments abound as the months go on. Whether you’re a member of “The Book Was Better” club or enjoy the film version, there is something for everyone. If you want to compare and contrast or just love a good spoiler, pick up the book to read before you start watching!

March

Daisy Jones & The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid

Everyone knows DAISY JONES & THE SIX, but nobody knows the reason behind their split at the absolute height of their popularity . . . until now. Daisy is a girl coming of age in L.A. in the late sixties, sneaking into clubs on the Sunset Strip, sleeping with rock stars, and dreaming of singing at the Whisky a Go Go. The sex and drugs are thrilling, but it’s the rock ‘n’ roll she loves most. By the time she’s twenty, her voice is getting noticed. Also getting noticed is The Six, a band led by the brooding Billy Dunne. On the eve of their first tour, his girlfriend Camila finds out she’s pregnant, and with the pressure of impending fatherhood and fame, Billy goes a little wild on the road.

Coming to Prime Video on March 3.

The Power by Naomi Alderman

The world is a recognizable place: there’s a rich Nigerian boy who lounges around the family pool; a foster kid whose religious parents hide their true nature; an ambitious American politician; a tough London girl from a tricky family. But then a vital new force takes root and flourishes, causing their lives to converge with devastating effect. Teenage girls now have immense physical power: they can cause agonizing pain and even death. And, with this small twist of nature, the world drastically resets.

Coming to Prime Video on March 31.

April

The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave

Before Owen Michaels disappears, he smuggles a note to his beloved wife of one year: Protect her. Despite her confusion and fear, Hannah Hall knows exactly to whom the note refers–Owen’s sixteen-year-old daughter, Bailey. Bailey, who lost her mother tragically as a child. Bailey, who wants absolutely nothing to do with her new stepmother. As Hannah’s increasingly desperate calls to Owen go unanswered, as the FBI arrests Owen’s boss, as a US marshal and federal agents arrive at her Sausalito home unannounced, Hannah quickly realizes her husband isn’t who he said he was. And that Bailey just may hold the key to figuring out Owen’s true identity–and why he really disappeared.

Coming to Apple TV+ on April 14.

The History of Tom Jones, A Foundling by Henry Fielding

Both a picaresque and Bildungsroman, The History of Tom Jones follows the life of its hero from his discovery as a foundling on the property of Squire Allworthy in England’s West Country to his banishment from the estate and subsequent journey to London to escape an arranged marriage. Tom’s many dalliances and misadventures throughout add to the charm of this bawdy romantic comedy. The famous characters -Squire Western, the chaplain Thwackum, the scheming Blifil, seductive Molly Seagrim, and Sophia, Tom’s true love–have come to represent Augustan society in all its loquacious, turbulent, comic variety.

Coming to PBS on April 30.

May

Text for You by Sofie Cramer

After a heated argument, Clara’s fiance stormed out of their apartment, but before they have a chance to reconcile, he died in a tragic accident. It has been two years, but she’s still paralyzed with grief, and her friends are worried about her. So, to try to say what was left unsaid, she starts texting his old phone. What she doesn’t realize is that the number has been reassigned. Across town, Sven’s phone begins receiving mysterious but heartfelt text messages. He doesn’t respond, but he is captivated by the sender. His own relationship has been on the rocks, and when it ends he sets out to find the person who has been texting him. Neither Sven nor Clara knew what they were setting out to find, but it would change both of their lives forever.

Coming to theaters on May 12 titled as Love Again.

City on Fire by Garth Risk Hallberg

New York City, 1976. Meet Regan and William Hamilton-Sweeney, estranged heirs to one of the city’s great fortunes; Keith and Mercer, the men who, for better or worse, love them; Charlie and Samantha, two suburban teenagers seduced by downtown’s punk scene; an obsessive magazine reporter and his idealistic neighbor–and the detective trying to figure out what any of them have to do with a shooting in Central Park on New Year’s Eve.

Coming to Apple TV+ on May 12.

-Melinda

Bookish Oscar Nominations

Photo by RODNAE Productions: https://www.pexels.com/photo/an-actor-holding-his-award-7005636/

And the Oscar goes too…the books behind the movies. It’s officially Oscar season! As we all know, books make great movies- and the Academy Awards agree. Several book-to-movie adaptations received Oscar nominations this year. The Oscars take place on March 12, so there’s plenty of time to pick up a book before the awards ceremony.

All Quiet on the Western Front

Based on All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque. Request the book.

The testament of Paul Baumer, who enlists with his classmates in the German army of World War I, illuminates the savagery and futility of war.

Nominated for Best Picture, Adapted Screenplay, Cinematography, International Feature Film, Production Design, Visual Effects, Makeup and Hairstyling, Original Score, and Sound.

Women Talking

Based on Women Talking by Miriam Toews. Request the book.

After learning the men in the community have been drugging and attacking women, eight Mennonite women meet in secret to decide whether they should escape.

Nominated for Best Picture and Adapted Screenplay

Request the movie.

The Whale

Based on the play by Samuel D. Hunter. Request the play.

A six hundred pound recluse hides away in his apartment eating himself to death. 

Nominated for Lead Actor, Supporting Actress, and Makeup and Hairstyling.

Request the movie.

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever

Based on the Black Panther comic series. Request the book.

The Black Panther is not just a super hero; as King T’Challa, he is also the monarch of the hidden African nation of Wakanda.

Nominated for Supporting Actress, Costume Design, Original Song, Makeup and Hairstyling, and Visual Effects.

Request the movie.

Blonde

Based on Blonde by Joyce Carol Oates. Request the book.

A fictional recreation of the life of Marilyn Monroe recounts the tale of her rise to stardom, as seen from Marilyn’s perspective.

Nominated for Lead Actress.

The Quiet Girl

Based on Foster by Claire Keegan. Request the book.

An Irish child taken by her father to live with relatives on a farm finds the love and affection she never knew before and begins to thrive.

Nominated for International Feature Film.

Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris

Based on Mrs. ‘Arris Goes to Paris by Paul Gallico. Request the book.

The irrepressible Mrs. Harris finds adventures that take her from her humble London roots to the heights of glamour in Paris

Nominated for Costume Design.

Request the movie.

Other literary nods are included in animated and short film categories, including Guillermo del Toro’s Pinnochio, Puss in Boots, The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse, and My Year of Dicks (based on Notes to Boys).

Speaking of awards, stop by the library to enter our Oscar winners contest. Select your predictions for Oscar winners for a chance to win a movie theater gift card.

Enjoy these blockbuster reads!

-Melinda

From Page to Screen: Winter Releases

Time for another round of upcoming book to film adaptations. Whether you’re looking for shows involving witches, time travel, or murder, you may find a new favorite show to binge watch this winter. If you want to compare and contrast or just love a good spoiler, pick up the book to read before you start watching!

December

Kindred by Octavia Butler

Dana’s torment begins when she suddenly vanishes on her 26th birthday from California, 1976, and is dragged through time to antebellum Maryland to rescue a boy named Rufus, heir to a slaveowner’s plantation. She soon realizes the purpose of her summons to the past: protect Rufus to ensure his assault of her Black ancestor so that she may one day be born. As she endures the traumas of slavery and the soul-crushing normalization of savagery, Dana fights to keep her autonomy and return to the present.

Coming to Hulu on December 13

The Pale Blue Eye by Louis Bayard

At West Point Academy in 1830, the calm of an October evening is shattered by the discovery of a young cadet’s body swinging from a rope. The next morning, an even greater horror comes to light. Someone has removed the dead man’s heart. Augustus Landor–who acquired some renown in his years as a New York City police detective–is called in to discreetly investigate. It’s a baffling case Landor must pursue in secret, for the scandal could do irreparable damage to the fledgling institution. But he finds help from an unexpected ally–a moody, young cadet with a penchant for drink, two volumes of poetry to his name, and a murky past that changes from telling to telling. 

Coming to Netflix on December 23

January

Will Trent

Based on the Will Trent series by Karin Slaughter, Book 1 is Triptych

In the city of Atlanta, young women are dying—at the hands of a killer who signs his work with a single, chilling act of mutilation. Leaving behind enough evidence to fuel a frenzied police hunt, this cunning madman is bringing together dozens of lives, crossing the boundaries of wealth and race. And the people who are chasing him must cross those boundaries too. Among them is Michael Ormewood, a veteran detective whose marriage is hanging by a thread—and whose arrogance and explosive temper are threatening his career. And Angie Polaski, a beautiful vice cop who was once Michael’s lover before she became his enemy.

Coming to ABC on January 3

Mayfair Witches

Based on the Lives of the Mayfair Witches series by Anne Rice, Book 1 is The Witching Hour

On the veranda of a great New Orleans house, now faded, a mute and fragile woman sits rocking . . . and The Witching Hour begins. It begins in our time with a rescue at sea.  Rowan Mayfair, a beautiful woman, a brilliant practitioner of neurosurgery–aware that she has special powers but unaware that she comes from an ancient line of witches–finds the drowned body of a man off the coast of California and brings him to life.  He is Michael Curry, who was born in New Orleans and orphaned in childhood by fire on Christmas Eve, who pulled himself up from poverty, and who now, in his brief interval of death, has acquired a sensory power that mystifies and frightens him.

Coming to AMC and AMC+ on January 8

February

Not Dead Yet

Based on Confessions of a Forty-Something F**k Up by Alexandra Potter

When her business goes bust and her fiancé with it, Nell’s happy ever after in California falls apart and she moves back to London to start over. But a lot has changed since she’s been gone. All her single friends are now married with children, sky-high rents force her to rent a room in a stranger’s house and in a world of perfect Instagram lives, she feels like a f**k up. Even worse, a forty-something f**k up.

Coming to ABC on February 8

You Season 4

Based on the You series by Caroline Kepnes

There is only one Guinevere Beck in New York City. She has a public Facebook account and Tweets incessantly, telling Joe everything he needs to know: she is simply Beck to her friends, she went to Brown University, she lives on Bank Street, and she’ll be at a bar in Brooklyn tonight–the perfect place for a “chance” meeting. As Joe invisibly and obsessively takes control of Beck’s life, he orchestrates a series of events to ensure Beck finds herself in his waiting arms. Moving from stalker to boyfriend, Joe transforms himself into Beck’s perfect man, all while quietly removing the obstacles that stand in their way–even if it means murder.

Coming to Netflix on February 9

-Melinda