Read the book first #2
I know I’ve said many times how much I don’t like spoilers…my favorite thing in entertainment is to be surprised.
However…
If I’m going to both read a book and see a movie, I want to read the book first. Oddly, I’ve never had a book spoil a movie for me, but I’ve had the reverse be true.
That might not be true for you. I know part of it probably is that I don’t visualize when I read. I’ve written about this before, too, but I don’t see the characters (or hear their voices) when I read. I also know that puts me in the minority (again). 
I remember when my Significant Other and I saw the first Harry Potter movie. My SO said Harry’s chin was wrong. I didn’t think that, because Harry’s chin hadn’t been described in the book. Messy black hair, glasses, and a scar…check.
The time when I found out that I was unusual in this was when I had read a book (back in the paper days), and then my SO was reading it. I asked my SO about how the book was going and I was told, “I’m having trouble reading it because when I hear this one character, I hear [the actor] Darren McGavin.” I said, “What do you mean?” “When I hear the voice, I hear Darren McGavin.”
Me: “You hear the character’s voice?”
SO: “You don’t hear the character’s voice?”
We had one of those classic committed couple “discussions” about which one of us was crazy. 
Well, as you know, I like to do the research.
I was teaching different groups of people most days at that point, training computer software. I started polling them.
It turned out that about fifteen percent of the people didn’t visualize the characters or hear the voices when they read.
So, that meant I was the weird one.
Actually, it varied quite a bit. In an advanced PowerPoint class, pretty much everybody would visualize. In an advanced Excel class, not very many people would.
I’ve had long discussions about this with people, and some of them seem to think it’s impossible for me to enjoy books without seeing the events. I get involved in it…it’s just all conceptual.
Oh, I do admit that sometimes I visualize a scene…if it’s poorly written. That surprises people, too…they think a well-written book is more likely to take you “into the scene”. For me, though, if something is not well-written, I may have to work out the logistics of the scene…where’s the window out of which that character jumped? Why couldn’t somebody stop that person…what was in the way?
The upshot of this long introduction is that, if I’m going to see a movie, I try to read the book first.
Here are some books that have upcoming (and early 2013) adaptations…in case you feel the same. I’m not listing everything, of course, and if you don’t see one, it may be because the publisher has blocked text-to-speech access in the Kindle edition (I don’t deliberately link to books which do that).
Beautiful Creatures (the movie) February 14
Beautiful Creatures (the book)
Warner Brothers probably hoped for the next Twilight franchise with this one, reportedly giving it a $60 million budget, and with a cast including Jeremy Irons, Emily Rossum, and Viola Davis. Unfortunately, it has not opened strongly in the USA.
The Host (the movie) March 29
The Host (the book)
It would be a surprise if this one doesn’t make a profit (especially with a $44 million reported budget). The novel was written by Stephenie Meyer (who wrote the Twilight series). Saoirse Ronan, while not a huge box office star, has a good reputation. The director/screenwriter, Andrew Niccol, isn’t normally a tentpole maker, but has done some interesting work (The Truman Show, In Time).
Alongside Night (the movie) July 12
Alongside Night (the book)
Originally published in 1979, this is a dystopian novel by J. Neil Schulman about the economic collapse of the United States and a counter-government movement. Since Schulman is also credited with the screenplay (and is directing), it sounds as though this may be a case of the author being able to revive a book which had fallen out of print, both through the Kindle platform and now a feature movie whose stars include Kevin Sorbo, Garrett Wang, and Jake Busey. I think there is somewhat of an audience for this, but I think it may be more of an arthouse picture than a mainstream hit.
Horns (the movie) October 11)
Horns (the book)
4.1 stars with 408 reviews at time of writing is a very good score on Amazon. This is a horror novel, but also has humor. Alexandre Aja directs Daniel Radcliffe, and the timing of the movie is good. I would guess we could be looking in the $60 million dogro (domestic gross) range for this one, but it’s always a difficult guess.
Carrie (the movie) October 18
Carrie (the book)
Actually, Horns had better make its money a hurry, with this movie right on its heels! This is a remake, of course, and the fact that it stars the magical Chloë Grace Moretz and Julianne Moore is a plus.
Ender’s Game (the movie) November 1
Ender’s Game (the book)
This could be the break-out non-sequel of the year…based on a book that is some people’s favorite book, with a great cast (Harrison Ford, Abigail Breslin, Hailee Steinfield). However, I do think there may be protests about the author of the book (Orson Scott Card), although that’s somewhat separate from the material of the book.
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (the movie) December 13
The Hobbit (the book)
This is part two of the trilogy (!) of movies based on the prequel to The Lord of the Rings. The first one has made about $300 million just in the USA, and this one should also do well.
Well, those are a few of the titles…happy reading, and see you in the movies!
This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.
