Ugh, no way.
I just ran across a review for the movie Colette, starring Keira Knightley and inspired by the life of the famous French author. I had no idea this movie was a thing, and while I see the reviewer describes the film as "politely sexy", I have my doubts that a biography of Colette could be anything other than profoundly depressing...
Cute~
I like these "Hero Bookends" from Uncommon Goods. (There's a "Heroine" one, too, don't worry.) They're cute, eye-catching, and, at $25, they'd make reasonably priced gifts...
Sure, why not?
According to Deadline, Legendary Entertainment has picked up the rights to Claire McFall's YA trilogy Ferryman, with an eye towards turning it into a create a franchise. I haven't read the books, but the article offers a nice summary...
Painful
Ouch: a bookstore in Bangor, Maine, suffered a massive loss recently when a water main burst near the building, seeping into the basement and destroying a number of rare books. The damage included dozens of first- and limited-edition Stephen King books, as well as...
Could be worse
Last week it was announced that George Clooney's upcoming miniseries adaptation of Joseph Heller's novel Catch-22 has been picked up by Hulu. I'm having trouble imagining how well Heller's story will translate to TV, but if I had to pick someone to direct it, I probably would have chosen...
The Complete Sookie Stackhouse Stories, by Charlaine Harris
Charlaine Harris's The Complete Sookie Stackhouse Stories is a collection of nine short stories and a novella. I'm not sure how hardcore Sookie Stackhouse junkies will feel about this book, but as a casual fan I actually found it more fun than a full-length novel—it offers a tantalizing glimpse of Harris's characters and world-building, but you get to skim over all the tedious background drama created by thirteen books' worth of storytelling...
Weekly Book Giveaway: The Complete Sookie Stackhouse Stories, by Charlaine Harris
This week's Book Giveaway is Charlaine Harris's The Complete Sookie Stackhouse Stories. Considering the popularity of this series, I'm always surprised by the homemade vibe of the cover art, which feels like something designed by an artsy middle school student. (But what do I know? Clearly, these books sell just fine.) Our full review will be posted soon...
This is our lives now
Slate informs me that The Wire creator David Simon announced that he is adapting Philip Roth’s novel The Plot Against America into a six-part miniseries. I haven't read this book, but it's apparently an alternate history in which aviation hero and rabid isolationist Charles A. Lindbergh...
Saga, the musical?
Man, Brian K. Vaughan is having a moment: first Runaways on Hulu is a success, and now there are rumors floating around that Lin-Manuel Miranda might, just possibly, one day adapt Vaughan's space-opera comic series Saga into a musical...
No singing!
According to Deadline, Masterpiece and BBC One are working together on an six-part "event adaptation" of Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables...
What happens next
The trailer is out for the second season of The Handmaid's Tale, which will take the series in a new direction now that they've covered the material in Margaret Atwood's book. I didn't watch the first season (because creepifying misery isn't my jam), but...
Renegades, by Marissa Meyer
I've been reading Marissa Meyer's work for a long time. She got her start writing fanfiction, then wrote a series of fairy tale adaptations, then followed those up with an origin story for a famous villain...
Weekly Book Giveaway: Renegades, by Marissa Meyer
This week's Book Giveaway is Renegades, the first book in a new series by the Lunar Chronicles' Marissa Meyer. I was never as emotionally invested in the Lunar Chronicles as I hoped to be, but I'm assuming this new series won't be so visibly cobbled together from outside sources (specifically, fairytales and Sailor Moon), so that might help. A full review will be posted later this week...
No, no, no
The trailer is out for the upcoming miniseries adaptation of Edward St. Aubyn's Patrick Melrose, starring Benedict Cumberbatch, and it looks perfectly miserable. I can't imagine why anyone would want to watch this, but I guess it's targeted at people who just can't get enough of Cumberbatch playing insufferable rich characters...
Pre-teen Holmes
According to Deadline, Stranger Things actress Millie Bobby Brown has signed on to star in a movie adaptation of the popular Enola Holmes mystery series, about the crime-solving baby sister of Sherlock and Mycroft Holmes...
Where's Little My?
There's a Moomin-themed children's hospital opening in Finland later this year, and the official Moomin website has some early pictures of the decor. Sadly, I don't see any images of my favorite character, Little My, but...
First Riverdale, now Sabrina
According to Pajiba, the creators of Riverdale are planning a 20-episode-long spin-off series about Sabrina the Teenage Witch. Kiernan Shipka (of Mad Men fame) has signed on as Sabrina, and they will be basing their storyline on the comic line...
Who knew?
There's a review up on the New York Times website of the new Amazon TV anthology series Electric Dreams, based on the short stories of Philip K. Dick. The showrunners seem taken aback by how difficult (and expensive) it was to cram the complexity of their material into 10 hour-long segments, but...
Pride and Prejudice and Mistletoe, by Melissa de la Cruz
I understand that successfully adapting Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice with a modern setting is a tall order. You can recycle the basics of the romantic plot—arrogant man, spirited woman, misunderstandings, self-discovery—pretty easily, but most of the book's nuance doesn't translate. (The stakes are not the same when Elizabeth has the option of ditching her family and getting a job.) But...
Weekly Book Giveaway: Pride and Prejudice and Mistletoe, by Melissa de la Cruz
Well, it's no longer the holidays, but it's always Pride and Prejudice season 'round these parts, so this week's Book Giveaway is Melissa de la Cruz's Pride and Prejudice and Mistletoe. Based on my previous exposure to Ms. de la Cruz's work, my hopes are not high, but we'll see. A full review will be posted shortly...
Weekend plans
For the second week in a row, we are ending our news coverage with a story I personally find hilarious: after receiving a cease-and-desist order from President Donald Trump’s lawyers, publisher Henry Holt & Co. has actually moved up their publication date of...
Anglophile foodies
I'm always attracted to yearly round-up posts, and this list of 2017's best food books is intriguing: I like the use of the word "splenetic", the cover art for The Folio Book of Food & Drink, and I definitely want to know more...
Bowie Book Club
According to Nerdist, David Bowie's son, director Duncan Jones, recently announced an online book club that will read through Bowie's list of 100 favorite books. The first book pick is Peter Aykroyd's 1985 novel Hawksmoor, which...
Farewell, Ms. Grafton
I was very sorry to hear of the death of mystery/suspense writer Sue Grafton, who died last week at age 77 after a two-year-long battle with cancer. According to her family, Ms. Grafton did not wish for her books to be made into movie or TV adaptations, and would absolutely not approve of a ghostwriter...
Well-reviewed (but I have my doubts)
There's a review over on the Guardian of the first installment of BBC One's miniseries adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's Little Women, and it's downright glowing. I'm obviously not the right audience for this production, because...
HAHAHAHAHA
It's a year-end gift from the Gods. If you haven't read the editing notes for Milo Yiannopoulos's book Dangerous, do yourself a favor and run, don't walk, to read them now. Thanks to Yiannopoulos's ill-advised lawsuit against his former publishers, all of his editor's notes are now a matter of public record...
Anticipatory
I'm enjoying the various "Books to Look Forward To in 2018" lists (although I feel compelled to cross my fingers that our president doesn't do something that gets us all killed before they come out). Huffington Post recently posted their top 60(!!!) picks, and...
Touching
In a bit of weird-but-sweet news, Open Culture recently posted a supportive letter Albert Einstein sent to Marie Curie when the public discovery of an affair that Curie was having with a fellow scientist threatened to...
Don't you want to read this, based on the cover alone?!?
If you'd like to start off the new year on a hopeful, socially-mindful note, Electric Literature just posted a helpful list of 46 books by women of color to read in 2018. It's an ambitious, intriguing list, and...