Book Was Better

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A01=Louise Willder
adaptation
ang lee
anna bogutskaya
Author_Louise Willder
bad films
bridget jones
Category=ATF
Category=ATZ
Category=CBW
Category=DSRC
Category=WH
Category=WZG
cinema speculation
emerald fennell
eq_art-fashion-photography
eq_bestseller
eq_biography-true-stories
eq_dictionaries-language-reference
eq_humour
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
film books
film buff
film lover
forthcoming
frankenstein
godfather
greta gerwig
hitchcock
jane austen
jaws
kubrick
letterboxd
merchant ivory
narnia
peter bradshaw
pride and prejudice
scorsese
spielberg
tarantino
the good the bad the multiplex
wes anderson
wuthering heights

Product details

  • ISBN 9780861547722
  • Dimensions: 129 x 198mm
  • Publication Date: 01 Oct 2026
  • Publisher: Oneworld Publications
  • Publication City/Country: GB
  • Product Form: Hardback
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Is the book always better than the film?

Yes, book lovers cry! Hollywood never gets it right – they gloss over crucial moments, the dialogue sounds bizarre and the characters never look like they’re supposed to.

But then what about Jaws or The Godfather? These films are so much better than the potboiler novels they came from. And then there are some perfect adaptations. Doesn’t every reader’s heart sing when they watch Ang Lee’s Sense and Sensibility?

In this rollicking adventure through the towering heights and unplumbed depths of book to screen adaptations, Louise Willder, the critically acclaimed author of Blurb Your Enthusiasm, uncovers what makes a good adaption, how some can be so bad, and why we insist on telling the same stories over and over and over.*

*As but one example: Pride and Prejudice 1940, 1980, 1995, 2005, 2027, Bridget Jones’ Diary, Austenland, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Fire Island, Lost in Austen, Bride and Prejudice

Louise Willder has worked as a copywriter in publishing for thirty years, reading and writing blurbs for thousands of books. Her previous book, Blurb Your Enthusiasm, was a Times Book of the Year, described as ‘a masterpiece’ in the Spectator and, to her mother’s delight, featured in Good Housekeeping’s Christmas books guide.

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