Some Thoughts on Book Adaptions for Television

I was going to write about the Apple+ series Lessons in Chemistry, but I descended into a completely different discussion and I feel it is a valid point to consider as I know most of the people I’ve discussed the topic of adaptation with always have an opinion: is the adaptation better than the original? Therefore, I will write another piece on Lessons in Chemistry if you are wondering why I would include it on a mystery blog.

I will start by stating that I chose to watch the television series first since I have been wanting to read the book for some time. I know I could get through more books if I used Audible; however, I don’t always love listening to the person telling me the story. A lot of times, their voice takes me out of the narrative, especially if I find it disagreeable and sadly, I seem to find many voices disagreeable. I don’t mind it as much if it is for a biography or a non-fiction subject, but usually, I like reading fiction the old-fashioned way. Holding a physical book in my hands, curling up on a couch, chair, or bed, and shifting into another world. It’s taken me several years to warm up to using Kindle. Again, I am more of a purist when it comes to reading but I appreciate the convenience of Kindle so I am slowly branching out.

One of the reasons I have stated before is that I like to watch a television series before I read the book. When I read a book, those characters are assigned looks, and personalities beyond what I have read but have inferred, and if I see something radically different onscreen, it is an assault on my senses. Couple that with locations that I might find radically different from my expectations, chosen by a location scout and director, and decorated by a production designer who might not agree with my sensibilities. It is a recipe for disaster. When this happens, I liken myself to Adrian Monk. I am completely OCD when it comes to acquiescing to somebody else’s ideas of how a story should happen once it is emblazoned in my brain cells. Unless it is extraordinary then I am happy to accept their vision.

I don’t want to go through a list of adaptations that I dislike. I know that those creators worked extremely hard on their craft and they are most likely proud of what they produced. It is, after all, my personal opinion and I don’t need to criticize something to the world just because it is not how I envisioned it.

I believe that films were the more volatile adaptations for me because most of the television adaptions in the 1970s and 1980s were reserved for TV Movies of the Week. Really big adaptations, such as Alex Haley’s Roots actually pre-empted regularly scheduled programming for eight consecutive nights. Another adaptation that I appreciated was the David Suchet version of Poirot. That is most likely because I read a lot of Agatha Christie as a teenager, and by the time I watched the Poirot series on PBS Masterpiece, I had forgotten exactly how I pictured him in my head. Funnily enough, when I was reading Anthony Horowitz’s Magpie Murders, I couldn’t help but see David Suchet as Atticus Pünd. You see, adaptations can play tricks in your head when you start adapting characters in books to TV series based on other books that you have read.

There are a few authors like Anthony Horowitz who can control their television adaptations. It is probably why I enjoyed the TV series Magpie Murders as much as the book. In the 1980s and beyond, authors like Jackie Collins also controlled how her miniseries were produced and had a hand in casting as well.

When the miniseries died out as a television outlet by the mid-1990s, book adaptations began to be used as a basis for television series, and then the reverse happened: popular shows such as Murder She Wrote and Diagnosis Murder generated their own series of novels based on the television series. This tie-in novelization practice became a huge outlet for children’s television series as well. Nancy Drew and The Hardy Boys mysteries first started as novels, then became various television series (both live-action and animated) in the 1950s and 1960s, as well as a joint television series for kids and teens in the 1970s, The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries, then had a new spinoff of novelization tie-ins and finally became several versions of Nancy Drew films with the latest being the 2007 self-titled Nancy Drew as well as new series (Nancy Drew and The Hardy Boys). Frankly, a dissertation should be written on how many versions of these books were created over the last century.

Things have evolved since those miniseries adaptation days. Now these literary adaptations are called limited television series and they have anywhere from three to ten episodes; however, six episodes tend to be the sweet spot. What is more confusing is that many limited series are based on original ideas but seem literary but I suppose that opens it up for fans if they spawn book publication deals as a result of a series’ popularity.

Ultimately, this leaves me in the same position. I usually follow my rules: first the television show or film, and then the novel. I don’t think I will ever change but I do know one thing, this way, by going backward, if I like the TV series, I will read the book and compare it with the TV series to see what I liked in the series versus what I liked in the novel. I can live with that. I liken it to someone exposing themselves to a phobia and getting adapted to it until they can live with it. In the end, it is all about narrative pleasure, and that can be a very personal choice.