Top Ten Tuesday: Books that I'd Like to See Turned Into a Movie / TV Show

"Top Ten Tuesday" is a book meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

From Lisa Genova's Still Alice to Gillian Flynn's Gone Girl, this year has been a veritable cornucopia of amazing books, turned into acclaimed movies (ignore the fact that those are both examples of books I love, but movies that I have still not managed to see). I was totally AMPED to see what today's "Top Ten Tuesday" topic was, because it gave me plenty of time to imagine what other works we might one day see headed to the big screen, if only in my dreams.

1. Throne of Glass, S.J. Maas - To tell you the truth, this is both the first book I thought of when approached with the topic, as well as the toughest one to adapt on this list. However, I hope I see it on a lot of other bloggers' lists as well... the world deserves this epic novel as a kick-ass, diverse, and enthralling fantasy blockbuster, if just so we can get more people to read it.

2 and 3. Sarah Strohmeyer's novels, Smart Girls Get What They Want and How Zoe Made Her Dreams (Mostly) Come True - Trust me: these would make the perfect good-girl ABC Family original movie... I'm a connoisseur of that kind of bright, cheery chick flick that could lay waste to an afternoon. They'd be like Disney Channel Original Movies' smart-alecky older sisters.

 

4. The Eyre Affair series, Jasper Fforde - This series of novels was basically already made for the Dr. Who crowd, with a distinctly literary twist, which would make it the perfect quirky, nerdy, and incredibly British BBC comedy series.

5. Frankenstein, Mary Shelley - Yes, I KNOW I KNOW I KNOW it's already been made into movies galore... but that's one of the reasons it needs to be done again, just RIGHT this time, dammit! Frankenstein's monster isn't some schlocky horror villain or shlumping goon... he's a shadowed spectre, an eloquent and verbosely observational outsider, who deserves a moody, noir, gritty suspense thriller with a period-accurate sensibility, preferably directed by Andrea Arnold (2011's Wuthering Heights adaptation, the one with Kaya Scoledario).

6. Eleanor & Park, Rainbow Rowell - Thankfully, and with much hype, the rights to a movie adaptation of this novel are already in the works (Dreamworks bought them early last year), but that doesn't mean I don't want it now! But mostly, I want a time-period-accurate coming-of-age story, kind of like Perks of Being a Wallflower, but for the '80s. It's going to be so awesome, because Rowell's writing the screenplay.

7. The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath - I know there was a version of this from the '70s or something, and the life of its author is something fairly ingrained in cultural consciousness by now, but this book has always been one of my favorites, because it made me feel like someone else knew what I was going through. I want something that would transcribe the mental state of depression and anxiety as effortlessly and completely to film, like it did in its novel format. Just like the novel and film Still Alice did for Alzheimer's disease!

8. The Nancy Drew series, Carolyn Keene - I watch the 2007 version frequently - it's one of the few purchases of movies I've ever made from iTunes - and I've seen every episode of the short-termed '70s telvesion show, but seriously? I want a do-over. A super retro, punchy-colored, meta-referencing Nancy Drew-palooza.

9. The Intern's Handbook, Shane Kuhn - I thought about how kick-ass a movie adaptation of this one would be, even as I was reading it... just imagine: a Kingsmen: the Secret Service-type stylized action spy blockbuster!


10. Most Important One: The Devil in the White City, Erik Larson

My younger sister and I were talking about this about two weeks ago, about how, when someone had asked me if I was excited about the Mr. Holmes movie, I had hoped they were talking about Dr. H. H. Holmes. Dubbed "America's First Serial Killer," this one man's shadow extended across the grounds of the Columbian Exposition in Chicago, 1893, and is presumed to have taken the lives of over 200 people, in his murderous, maze-like hotel.

Apparently, Leo DiCaprio already owns the rights to this - which, admittedly, he'd probably do a good job with - but my sister and I already have our own ideas as to what this movie would have to include... namely, the poster being a lone footprint, burned with acid into a steel door (if y'all have read this book, you know what I mean). It would be a creepy, dark, manipulative thriller, where the real terror wouldn't be just from the atrocities committed, but how the outside world, with the bustle of the World's Far, would be rendered completely oblivious to it all.

What's Your Top Ten?