From Page to Screen

Catch up with Bosch, Henrietta Lacks, The Handmaid's Tale, and the latest TV/film adaptation news

With a slew of book adaptations from a variety of genres hitting the television screen this month, don’t miss out on your chance to compare the original books to their TV counterparts. We’ve also rounded up the latest film/TV announcements so you can get a head start.  

This Month’s Releases

The third season of the Amazon original series Bosch launched on the company’s streaming service on April 21. This television show is based on the wildly popular Harry Bosch series by Michael Connelly, which has a 20th book due this fall. Throughout the course of the series, Harry Bosch has worked as a private detective and for the Los Angeles Police Department, working for both the open unsolved and robbery homicide units throughout his career. Each season of the show adapts a different book in the series. This season is based on the first book in the series, The Black Echo, which follows Bosch as he hunts for the killer who murdered a man he fought side by side with in Vietnam. The show has been renewed for a fourth season so you may just want to get through the whole series right now and be ready.

On April 22, HBO premiered their TV movie adaptation of the nonfiction book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. Henrietta Lacks was a poor African American woman in Maryland whose cervical cancer cells were used in the name of science without her family’s knowledge. Upon removal of her tumor at Johns Hopkins, doctors noticed that the cells continued to thrive outside of her body. Even though she passed away at the age of 31, Henrietta’s cells continue to grow and have been used in development of the polio vaccine, cloning, gene mapping, and more. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks takes you on an intriguing journey through the world of medical science and explores the ethical issues surrounding it.

Enjoy learning? On April 26 National Geographic premieres their ten-part miniseries Genius, which is based on Walter Isaacson's biography Einstein: His Life and Universe. This biography explores how despite a life of struggles Einstein was able to make groundbreaking discoveries such as the theory of relativity. Walter Isaacson is the author of the bestsellers Benjamin Franklin: An American Life and Steve Jobs.

Also April 26th Hulu releases their take on Margaret Atwood’s classic dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale. Like the book, the 10-episode series takes place in the Republic of Gilead (formerly the United States), in a dystopian future ruled by right-wing fanatics working to take away the rights of women and minorities. How does a 1985 novel covering such controversial subject matter translate to a TV show in today’s social and political climate? The Handmaid’s Tale is a must-read for Atwood fans and those interested in the show.

Announcements

This just in: Deadpool returns June 1, 2018 after making some serious noise on the big screen last year. Fox is planning to up the ante on graphic novel film releases with two other X-Men universe releases in 2018: New Mutants and X-Men: Dark Phoenix. That's a lot to catch up on, but we've got you covered. Browse X-Men or all things Marvel for more. 

When the trailer for the September 8 film release of Stephen King’s creepy clown horror It dropped recently, it smashed the record for most-viewed trailer in its first 24 hours. But of course, It is just one of many great Stephen King novels to make the jump page to screen. Find out why with binge-worthy scare-fest of some of the best: The Shining, Misery, Carrie, and Christine.

Imagine Entertainment has acquired film rights to J.D. Vance's New York Times bestselling memoir Hillbilly Elegy, which tells the story of the evolution of Vance's family, whose grandparents lived in poverty. Two generations later J.D. graduated from Yale. While the memoir is about Vance's life and family, it also examines the working class in the Appalachian area and highlights the struggles of America's white underclass. No news yet on the film’s production and release, but Ron Howard has been tapped as Director.

The BBC is developing a three-episode thriller series based on Jessie Burton’s The Miniaturist, with PBS acting as co-producer. A historical fiction novel set in seventeenth-century Amsterdam, The Miniaturist tells the story of a young whose husband gives her a doll-house like cabinet that looks like their home as a wedding gift. The miniaturist she hires to fill it creates pieces that eerily resemble the woman’s family and life. Her search for answers to the mysterious craftsmanship creates a suspenseful story ripe for a Masterpiece adaptation. While the TV release date is unknown, grab the book now and be ready.

SP Entertainment Group is developing Piers Anthony’s fantasy series Xanth as both a film and a television series. Beginning in 1977 with A Spell for Chameleon, the series was originally intended to be a trilogy. Xanth has now sold millions of copies and consists of 41 titles with another due this month, making it perhaps the world’s largest fantasy series. The popularity of Xanth lies in its combination of witty humor with classic fantasy elements and characters like magic, centaurs, demons, dragons, goblins, golems, harpies, merfolk, zombies, and more.

Tell us what you think… Which adaptations are you most excited for? Do you always read the book first or sometimes after the film/TV version?

Read more by Devin B.