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I have a burning need to know stuff and I love asking awkward questions.

Saturday, November 05, 2022

Book2Screen – The Pre-Blog Files (Part 2)   

During the very earliest years of my reading journey (or quest even!) I was always looking for inspiration as to what to read next, and next after that. At the time I was HEAVILY into all things SF but, at least from time to time, wanted to change things up a bit. Of course, the problem was – how do I decide? Without much in the way of literature history to draw on yet and without ready advice from friends and family I looked to two other media I was heavily involved in: movies and TV. So, I started looking for and reading the adapted novels that I’d enjoyed on both the big and small screen. That definitely led me in some interesting directions...! 

The History Man by Malcolm Bradbury 

Moonraker by Ian Fleming 

The Dogs of War by Frederick Forsyth 

Rumpole of the Bailey by John Mortimer 

1990 by Wilfred Greatorex 

The Graduate by Charles Webb 

Cider With Rosie by Laurie Lee 

Waxwork by Peter Lovesey 

Rollerball by William Harrison 

The Andromeda Strain by Michael Crichton 

The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole by Sue Townsend 

Shogun by James Clavell 

Rather a mix there, which is a good thing! Some of the above were movie related (mostly obvious) as well as a sprinkling of UK TV stuff. Some of them turned out to be one-off reads whilst others like Forsyth and Crichton led to some heavy reading time. At least one more deep dive into my pre-Blog list to come.  

2 comments:

James said...

I guess I've usually been inspired to explore films after reading the book. But there are a few exceptions and at least one on your list - watching the Chrichton film preceded my reading that book, although I wasn't inspired to read more by him. And I wasn't aware that The History Man had been filmed. I'll have to do a blog post on the reverse, books that inspired me to see the film version (usually disappointing).

CyberKitten said...

'The History Man' was a BBC TV mini-series from 1981. My university experience wasn't *anything* like the book! [lol]

I remember reluctantly being dragged along to the Wil Smith version of 'I, Robot'. Despite it being VERY different from the original Asimov idea I kinda ending up liking it because some of the core messages actually made it onto the screen. I hated what they did to Susan Calvin though - she was SO out of character as to be nonsensical!