First off, thank you for reading my newsletter. I have so much fun sharing bookish news and reviews with you. I would love to grow this so if you have anyone you think would enjoy this, please take a moment to forward it.
I usually save my reviews for the end of the newsletter, but I just listened to what will surely be one of my favorites this year:
A Knock at Midnight by attorney Brittany K Barnett is completely spellbinding. She writes about working on behalf of those serving extreme sentences for minor drug infractions, while she weaves in her personal narrative. She explains how mandatory sentencing force people who never spent a day behind bars find themselves locked up for life in federal prison. By focusing on a few cases (particularly that of Sharanda Jones) she compels us to care about this issue. It is more than that, Barnett’s writing is amazing and she made me feel so many things – I gasped out loud, teared up multiple times, and broke out in smiles. This book is both a necessary indictment of systemic problems in the penal system, and a beautiful story of love, family, and resilience. It makes a great companion to Brian Stevenson’s Just Mercy; both should be required reading. I listened to A Knock at Midnight and highly recommend the audio version read by Karen Chilton.
Book vs. Movie
When I hear that a book I love is being filmed as a movie, I get so excited… then usually end up disappointed in the results. How can someone else’s vision ever match what I have created in my head? I loved reading Where Did You Go Bernadette?, but avoid the movie because of bad reviews.
For me, the key to enjoying movie adaptations is to let some time simmer between reading and viewing. I notice when the two events fall close together, I am more likely to get distracted by the details. Is the movie following the plot exactly? Do the characters look like how I pictured? If some time has passed (a few months) then I am more likely to just hope that the movie follows the spirit and flow of the book. It doesn’t have to align perfectly, it just needs to give me the same feels.
In late fall, I read Remains of the Day for my bookclub. A few people in our meeting had clearly watched the movie right after reading the book and were preoccupied with specific details not lining up with the book. I finally got around to watching it on a rainy Saturday recently and felt that the movie did a good job of capturing the spirit of the book and the characters. It is the difference between viewing it through a wide-angle lens versus a microscope.
Great Book and Movie Matches - both the book and movie are fabulous:
Just Mercy by Brian Stevenson – The movie and book are so worth it.
Me Before You by Jojo Moyes – I sobbed through both.
The Road by Cormac Mccarthy – Sparse sentences in the book are matched by the haunting atmosphere of the film.
News of The World by Paulette Jiles – I absolutely loved this book and enjoyed the movie, though the movie may have been changed a bit to much. (We saw this as a family and everyone really liked it)
By the way, even though the News of the World movie was excellent, I don’t think it holds a candle to True Grit (the 2010 movie). And while I am doing free associations, I keep hearing how wonderful Lonesome Dove is (the novel). Though long (over 800 pages), it appears over and over as people’s all-time favorite book (it has 4000+ five star reviews on Amazon).
Movie Adaptation News:
1. Kristen Hannah, Kristen Hannah, Kristen Hannah!
Has anyone watched the just released Firefily Lane on Netflix? It is based on her early breakout book. I started but never finished this book ages ago. At 10 episodes long, I will probably pass.
Elle and Dakota Fanning are playing two French sisters struggling to survive German occupation in The Nightingale adaptaion. I love this casting and am so excited to see the movie, but it is not expected until the end of 2021.
And finally, her other hugely popular book The Great Alone is also being made into a movie but no word on casting or release date.
2. Reese Withersponn and her media company, Hello Sunshine, are producing the film version of Where the Crawdads Sing. If you loved that book, check here for a casting update. And if you haven’t read that book – you may be the only person left in America that hasn’t. This book has had an astonishing staying power that very few recent books come close to. If you want to read more about the author and the book check this out.
For your viewing pleasure: Illustrator Matt Stevens has created a project Good Movies as Old Books where he envisions movies he loves as classic paperbacks. I love this so much!
Recent Reads:
![The Sun Down Motel by [Simone St. James]](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!_gs7!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fab7edcfc-1059-4958-ad1c-abfa68ed75d9_333x500.jpeg "The Sun Down Motel by [Simone St. James]")
The Sundown Motel is the perfect combination of mystery and ghost story. The underlying story involves Viv, a young woman, who disappeares one night at the eerie and isolated Sundown Motel. Thirty five years later her niece, Carly, comes back to find out what happened. The author successfully navigates the two timelines as the reader follows both Aunt Viv and Carly as they uncover the strange goings-on in the town of Fell, NY. Viv worked at the motel as the night desk and her niece takes up the same job. As Carly begins to uncover leads, past events become entwined with the present. This book has a great sense of place and time. I was truly scared in a couple places and also found the mystery well plotted and satisfying. I highly recommend this fun and sometimes scary book!
Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi a quiet book with a deep message. Set in a small Japanese café, legend has it that not only can you get a cup of coffee, you can also travel back in time. Yet time travel is not so simple – there are strict rules: You can only stay as long as your coffee is warm; You can’t change the future by visiting the past; and you are limited to who you can visit in the past. The story is four connected tales of people who choose to travel back in time. Though this book starts a bit slow, I grew to love the characters. By the end felt deeply about the different experiences they were all dealing with. The cover looks cute and playful, but the people who come to the café are wrestling with lost love, sibling relationships, aging, and illness. The question that the author astutely answers at the end is, if you can’t change the past, is it still worth visiting.
From my gram….
Controversial opinion ahead: I did not love The Glass Hotel and at one point I wanted to throw it across the room. Mandel is clearly a gifted writer, but this novel about a hotel and a Ponzi scheme lacked something. It may be the structure that is held together loosely by people barely connected. Or maybe it is the fact that every person in this book is involved, on some level, in theft or deceit. For me to really connect to a book, I need to be rooting for at least one character. This book is missing that. Though her structure is clearly intentional and she ties up all the loose ends, by the last page, I stopped caring what happened.
West with the Giraffes by Lynda Rutledge is fun and fast paced historical fiction. Based around the true story of the San Diego Zoo’s first giraffes; they arrive after a harrowing boat trip from Africa to New York and then take a dangerous drive across the county in a makeshift trailer. The main character is young Woodrow Wilson Nickle, an orphan who escapes from the Oklahoma dust bowl only to end up without a penny in NY. When he sees the giraffes arrive by boat, all he can do is follow them West. This book is an adventure and I enjoyed the setting and pacing. I found myself involved in Woody Nickel’s plight and that of the giraffes. There are some well developed characters as well as some down right bad guys. If you enjoy historical fiction, this is a fun one.
Here is to finding a book that will get you through the last weeks of winter!
I enjoy your newsletter each month. Thanks for all the recommendations. I read Lonesome Dove many years, ago, but I still remember it as one of my favorites. It belongs on your "to read" list.
I love historical fiction!! I’m going to read “West with Giraffes”. Love your newsletter!