British Author Challenge July 2021: Don't judge a book by its movie

A Single Man (2009)

My other hobby is watching movies, so for July I'm combining my two hobbies for a theme of books that have been adapted for film or television. Rules are simple: read a book that's been made into a film or TV series, watch the adaptation, and compare the two. You must read the book and watch the adaptation for full points.*

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^{*No actual points are awarded.}

We aren't what you'd call short of options here. Wikipedia's pages on British novels adapted into film and Television shows based on British novels are excellent resources for finding book/adaptation combos.

Suggestions

Fantastic Mr. Fox by Roald Dahl
Captain Blood by Rafael Sabatini
A Dance to the Music of Time by Anthony Powell
Tony Hill/Carol Jordan series by Val McDermid ---> Wire in the Blood TV Series
Chocolat by Joanne Harris
Going Postal by Terry Pratchett
Good Omens by Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Small Island by Deborah Levy
American Gods by Neil Gaiman
James Bond series by Ian Fleming
The Far Pavilions by M. M. Kaye
Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones
The Buddha of Suburbia by Hanif Kureishi
Lucifer by Mike Carey
Hellblazer series ---> Constantine film has elements from the Dangerous Habits arc, the Constantine TV series draws from Original Sins and The Devil You Know, and the animated movie Constantine: City of Demons confusingly is an adaptation of All His Engines rather than the City of Demons book.
Lost Empires by J. B. Priestly
Vile Bodies by Evelyn Waugh --->Bright Young Things
To Serve Them All My Days by R. F. Delderfield
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë (My favorites are the 1943 version with Orson Wells and the 2005 mini-series with Ruth Wilson and Toby Stephens.)
High Rise by J. G. Ballard
My Family and Other Animals by Gerald Durrell --->The Durrells in Corfu
To Sir, With Love by E. R. Braithwaite
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Brontë
The Last Dragonslayer by Jasper Fforde
The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro
A Room with a View by E. M. Forster
Inspector Rebus series by Ian Rankin --->Rebus
Takeshi Kovacs series by Richard Morgan --->Altered Carbon
V for Vendetta by Alan Moore
Mrs. Palfrey at the Claremont by Elizabeth Taylor
All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot
The Hippopotamus by Stephen Fry
I, Claudius by Robert Graves
Regeneration by Pat Barker
The Quite American by Graham Greene
Theatre by Somerset Maugham --->Being Julia
Poldark Saga series by Winston Graham
Royal Flash by George Macdonald Fraser
Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson (I love the 1990 version with Charleton Heston and Christian Bale.)
Orlando by Virginia Woolf
Tom Jones by Henry Fielding
The Pursuit of Love by Nancy Mitford
Cabal by Clive Barker--->Nightbreed
White Teeth by Zadie Smith
A Month in the Country by J. L. Carr
Morality Play by Barry Unsworth--->The Reckoning
Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie

Some more come to mind:
--Wuthering Heights
--All of Jane Austen
--Most (if not all) of Dickens
--Trollope's Barsetshire series, Palliser series, The Way We Live Now, and also a movie just on Dr Thorne (from the Barsetshire series)
--Thackeray's Vanity Fair
--North and South and Wives and Daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell
--The Woman in White came out a couple of years ago.
--Call the Midwife
--Howards End--there's a recent one with Matthew MacFadyen
and my personal favorite Lark Rise to Candleford

Right now my choice is To Serve them All My Days--I have not read the book, nor seen the series.

Of your list I can highly recommend A Month in the Country, both the book and the movie. The movie features a very young Kenneth Branagh and even younger Colin Firth.
Also I loved Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont, both the book and film.

>3 kac522: Both book and movie of A Month in the Country are lovely. This is another month where there are so many options to choose from that it's difficult to know where to start.

How about Goodbye Mr. Chips?

>5 fuzzi: I'd heard of the movies, but didn't realize they're based on a book.

Hi - looking at OUTLANDER, Harry Potter, and, Briget Jones Diary...?

As I look through "Your books," there are so many good ones that could be made into movies instead of all the pervasive violent ones.

>6 amanda4242: I saw the 1984 version with Roy Marsden, a very good series.

>7 m.belljackson: *whispers*Gabaldon is American.

Two Some more:

A Passage to India
The Flame Trees of Thika
The Lord of the Rings
Atonement
Wolf Hall
Lady Chatterley's Lover

>10 laytonwoman3rd: I see your Lord of the Rings and raise you The Hobbit--to be read in conjunction with the animated version. (The first Peter Jackson Hobbit movie can be summed up as three hours and no fucking dragon.)

I'm partial to Ken Russell's Lady Chatterley, staring a very young Sean Bean as the gamekeeper.

The Sharpe series or the Uhtred series both by Bernard Cornwall
The Ipcress File or indeed much by Len Deighton
John Le Carre is also a rich source of material here.

I will definitely read the first Potty Harry book because I promised Marianne and CP Snow's Corridors of Power so one from TV and one from the silver screen.

I'm planning to read Agatha Christie's After the Funeral and then watch the TV adaptation on BritBox.

>9 amanda4242: Well, Scotland needs to offer her dual-citizenship!

>12 PaulCranswick: Love the Sharpe books and movies. I thought about adding them to the suggestions list but decided against it since Cornwell is one of next month's authors.

>13 cbl_tn: There are certainly a lot of Christie adaptations from which to choose.

>14 m.belljackson: She's probably doing a lot for their tourism industry!

>15 amanda4242: Ah yes. Good point on Cornwell.

Favourite British adapted film?

My favourite would probably be This Sporting Life based on the book by David Storey. It is set in my hometown of Wakefield and 60 years on some of the places are still amazingly recognisable.

Very tough though because so many great books have made films or TV series (I Claudius was a good TV series but a great book). Here is the list of the top 100 British Films as decided by the BFI (British Film Institute) many of which were British books.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BFI_Top_100_British_films

>18 PaulCranswick: Was it Richard Harris who starred in This Sporting Life?

I've seen 27 of the films on the list. I was pleasantly surprised to see If.... listed so high, but incensed that the divine 1963 adaptation of Tom Jones is down at 51!

>19 amanda4242: Tom Jones is too low on the list, I agree.

I love the gritty Get Carter which is based on the book Jack's Return Home by Ted Lewis.

Who knew? There's a whole book/movie list on LT (not all British, however):

https://www.librarything.com/list/416/all/Read-the-book-and-saw-the-movie

>21 kac522: Surprises me not at all. I may have missed a few but it looks like of read the book and seen the movie for 199 titles on the list, and there were several I didn't count because I've either only read the book or seen the movie.

Love Actually appears to be only a film...or based on one of the listed books...?

We watch it every year in December.

84, Charing Cross Road!

>24 laytonwoman3rd: I think Helene Hanff was American.

>25 kac522: Yes...I got carried away. Obviously, part of the point of that book was that she was an American. Still, a great book-to-movie offering.

>23 m.belljackson: I'm pretty sure it's not based on a book.

Fantastic Mr. Fox by Roald Dahl, illustrated by Quentin Blake
Fantastic Mr. Fox directed by Wes Anderson

I've loved the book since childhood, and have fond memories of reading it under the covers with a flashlight. I'm glad to report that it does hold up to re-reading and that I'm still charmed by the roguish Mr. Fox.

I did not have high hopes for the movie when it was first announced since I've always found Anderson to be a very hit and miss filmmaker. I was happy to find that Fantastic Mr. Fox is one of the hits, although I think it tries a little too hard to be quirky and clever. The stop-motion animation and color palette give the film a distinctive look, and the voice talent is top-notch. It's not quite as good as the book, but it's an adaptation that does get it right.

A Month in the Country (J L Carr)





I'm cheating as I actually reread and rewatched this last year. It's an old, often read, favourite. And for me, a rare incidence of the film doing justice to the novella.

This is also true of On The Black Hill (Bruce Chatwin)

A Month in the Country is available on Tubi, an ad-supported streaming service.

>29 Caroline_McElwee: Oh, I didn't know there was a movie of On the Black Hill. I have the book on hand.

>29 Caroline_McElwee: iI haven't seen either of those on the screen but loved both books - especially the Chatwin.

5 stars for A Month in the Country - I will look for the movie!

I've just started watching the new All Creatures Great and Small series and am really enjoying it. The scenery is breathtaking!

Haven't seen the new series but I used to love the old one. Books are great fun too.

>34 amanda4242: I watched the new series recently (or rather, started watching it late last year but it aired at a bad time so I forgot it and then binged it a few weeks ago just before they were taken off the Public Service streaming platform). It’s really great, and I love the scenery and the clothes are amazing!

>24 laytonwoman3rd: hear! Hear! (even if the author is US)

>35 PaulCranswick: it was the 1975 movie that inspired me to read All Creatures Great and Small, and then the other books, and then the original series with Robert Hardy, bwahaha. Great casting.

>34 amanda4242: We watched the new series (after having grave misgivings about disloyalty to the original cast) and we loved it as well.

Wow! Looks like there's a lot of love for James Herriot stories! I've downloaded the book and will get to it after I finish the TV series. (Yes, I know, bad Amanda watching before reading. But in my defense I only have access to the show for a limited time.)

>40 amanda4242: I haven't read any of the books yet, but this discussion prompted me to look at the library systems near me and see if they had any of them. Not available at my current system, but the one in the town I work in (and that I'm planning to move to) does have most of them so I'll probably get to them later in the year.

>41 PawsforThought: the Herriot books are easy reads, almost read like short story collections. Some make me laugh, some make me tear up, and others just make me smile.

>42 fuzzi: Ah, now I want to read them even more! They’d be perfect summer books. (As if I didn’t have enough to read this summer)

>43 PawsforThought: agree on Summer reads. I might pick up the original and re-read...

If anyone else is as into watching real life vet shows as I am, I thoroughly recommend “The Yorkshire Vet” which follows veterinarians in the area of Yorkshire where James Herriot lived and worked, including at his old practise. Not for the faint of heart, since the camera doesn’t shy away from showing the realities of farm life and sick and injured animals, but a good show with people who care a lot about their work.
And it’s narrated by Christopher Timothy, who played Herriot in the 1970’s series.
Not sure where people can watch the whole thing (there are at least 12 seasons), but a number of episodes are available on YouTube.

I am a long-time Herriot fan as well. My family used to listen to the audiobooks on road trips. They make great travel books because, as @fuzzi observed, they're like short story collections. It's easy to stop and start without losing the narrative thread. The audiobooks are narrated by Christopher Timothy, who played James Herriot in the original TV series. I highly recommend them!

>39 laytonwoman3rd: I'm glad to know that the new series holds up well for another fan of the original series! I haven't watched any episodes of the new series yet because I loved the original series so much. It was so well cast, and the actors worked well together.

>45 PawsforThought: The Yorkshire Vet is available on Acorn TV, as is Vintage Roads Great & Small with Christopher Timothy and Peter Davison (who played James Herriot and Tristan Farnon in the original series).

>46 cbl_tn: That's great news for all American vet show fans. We don't have Acorn here, but the majority of seasons have been on Viaplay, so I've seen them there.

I tried a few episodes of Yorkshire Vet, and it was a bit too much for me. I need the "no animals were harmed in the filming" distance that fiction gives, I guess. (I realize they didn't actually harm the animals themselves.) One of the positives about the new All Creatures series is that they went to great lengths not to exploit animals as they made it. No arms were actually inserted into cows, etc.

Archive.org has If Only They Could Talk on one-hour loan, which I usually hate but works fine in this case, so I couldn’t help myself and started reading. One chapter in.
I actually laughed out loud as this part: “A cow standing in the middle of a gleaming floor while a sleek veterinarian surgeon in a spotless parturition overall inserted his arm to a polite distance. He was relaxed and smiling, the farmer and his helpers were smiling, even the cow was smiling. There was no dirt or blood or sweat anywhere.
The man in the picture had just finished and had moved next door to do a bit of calving just for the sheer pleasure of it, as a kind of dessert.”

The latest Humble Bundle is a bunch of Mark Millar graphic novels, many of which have been adapted for TV or film. Some included titles: Kingsman, Wanted, Jupiter's Legacy, and Kick-Ass.

https://www.humblebundle.com/books/millarworld-netflix-comics-from-image-comics-...

>49 PawsforThought: I remember that part!! 😂😂😂

A serendipitous sale: Herriot's All Things Bright and Beautiful is on sale for $2.99 from various retailers, while Google Play has it and books 3-5 of the series for $2.99.

Correction: Google has books 3-5 available to *rent* at that price. Freaking deceptive pricing.

A British author who has a LOT of his works translated to film is Alistair MacLean. Some that come to mind:

The Guns of Navarone
Force Ten From Navarone
Breakheart Pass
Ice Station Zebra
Where Eagles Dare

Just to name a few.

Almost everything I have read by MacLean has been highly entertaining, suspenseful, and his works often have endings that I don't see coming. And he's fairly "clean": not much in the way of graphic violence or sex.

>53 fuzzi: I haven't read Where Eagles Dare, but I can recommend the movie--the fight on the cable car is fantastic!

At the end of last month's challenge I finished Our Mutual Friend on audiobook.

I've now watched the only filmed (TV) version I know of: Our Mutual Friend. It followed the book as closely as a 4 part series can. Absolutely outstanding was David Morrissey as Bradley Headstone--unforgettable performance.

It was also interesting to compare the voices that were in my head from Simon Vance's audiobook to the film characters. A few were quite different; most were as I imagined them. A young Keeley Hawes couldn't put together a poor waterfront girl's accent--she sounded like she had just come out of Harrod's or something. Otherwise a very good film on the whole.

All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot
All Creatures Great and Small Season 1 {2020 series}

The book is the perfect summer reading: light, undemanding, and utterly charming.

The TV series is much the same as the book, although they did make a few parts overly dramatic. Still thoroughly enjoyable, and I'm looking forward to the second season.

>56 amanda4242: Loved it, although it took me the entire season to train my ear to the Yorkshire accent.

>57 kac522: I did have to resort to subtitles once or twice, myself.

>56 amanda4242: I'm so glad you enjoyed the book!

>59 fuzzi: It would be very hard not to like it.

The Eagle of the Ninth by Rosemary Sutcliff

Sutcliff had such a gift for making an era come to life! This is my second time reading The Eagle of the Ninth, and this time I was struck by how she never forgets that Marcus sustains a career-ending injury at the beginning of the book; so many writers have their characters be inexplicably healed, but Sutcliff shows Marcus's long recovery, his setbacks, and shows that while there are things he can no longer do, there are many other he still can.

The Eagle of the Ninth {1977 mini-series}

This mini-series is typical of what I've seen of BBC productions in the 70s: faithfully adapted, reasonably well acted, and produced on what appears to be a budget of two pounds and a cup of tea. Not the greatest thing ever made, but I enjoyed it.

It's on youtube if anyone wants to take a look. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLEjWO5ZEvW0ebuCjJv2C3ql_S-zkjUGlN

The Eagle {2011 film} directed by Kevin Macdonald

And proof that a larger budget doesn't automatically equal a better movie. It's clear that the filmmakers did actually read the book, but they cut most of the character moments that make the book a treasure and replaced them with fights and moralizing so we're left with a generic sword and sandal story. That being said, there are really only three departures that I feel are flat out wrong: not freeing Esca before going North was a mistake because it's important that it's his choice to go; cutting the Demetrius of Alexandria bit was a mistake because it's dumb to go on a covert mission without a cover story; and having the remnants of the Ninth Legion come to the rescue was a mistake because it's just silly.

>61 amanda4242: I watched that film some years ago (when it was fairly new) and hated it. Didn’t know it was based on a book.
I don’t remember much of it except that I kept wondering why they’d made the film in the first place.

>62 PawsforThought: It's not the worst movie I've ever seen, but that's not saying much because I've seen a lot of really bad movies. The scenery was lovely and I liked the score.

I do recommend the book; the character development is much stronger, so we get a story of two friends going on a well-planned expedition rather than two sullen near-strangers going into dangerous territory on a whim.

Kingsman: The Secret Service by Mark Millar

A young man from a council estate gets tapped to be a secret agent. Not really anything spectacular going on here, mostly just an excuse for some mindless action.

Kingsman: The Secret Service {2014 film} directed by Matthew Vaughn

This is one of the few cases where I think the movie improves upon the source material. The characters and plot are more fleshed out, the nods to classic spy movies are fun, and Colin Firth gives the whole thing a nice touch of class.

I read The Railway Children by E. Nesbit (1906). Although familiar with the title, I had never read the book. It was good, and I'm sure I would have loved it as a child. Most interesting for me as an adult was the Afterword by Peter Glassman, in which he explained that Father's story was inspired by the Dreyfus Affair and the Russian gentleman is loosely based on a real contemporary Russian writer who had fled to England.

I watched the 1970 film version with Jenny Agutter, who I know from "Call the Midwife", and it was amazing to see her at age 17! A little older now, but amazingly quite recognizable. Also fun to see that it was filmed in Keighley, Yorkshire. In 2017 we took the Keighley Heritage train on the way to visit the Bronte Parsonage in Haworth, so the train scenes felt authentic.

>65 kac522:. The Railway Children is my fave Children's book. I also enjoyed that film version. The more recent version has Jenny A plays the mother, which was interesting.

>66 Caroline_McElwee: Oh, thanks! I'll see if I can get that one.

Re-read (via audiobook) Lady Susan, by Jane Austen (1794; first publ. 1871); read by Juliet Stevenson. Always funny with the two of the best lines in Austen:

"My dear Alicia, of what a mistake were you guilty in marrying a man of his age!--just old enough to be formal, ungovernable & to have the Gout--too old to be agreeable, & too young to die."

topped only by:
"Facts are such horrid things!"

And then watched the movie based on Lady Susan, Love and Friendship. Still smiling!

Now that Paul has finally read it, how about Harry Potter?

The first movie was memorable!

>68 kac522: Lady Susan is such catty fun! Glad to hear the movie is good, too.

You probably couldn't get much more of a British institution cum film franchise as I have read Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone for the challenge.

>69 m.belljackson: The books and movies are fun, but they start to get bloated by Goblet of Fire and the bulk of Deathly Hallows is just info dumps of stuff that should have been introduced much early in the series.

My mind has been in Middle Earth rather than Hogwarts since a local theatre is showing the extended cuts of the trilogy and I've snagged tickets for the Saturday matinee showing of The Two Towers; it's my favorite and tickets were $4!

>71 PaulCranswick: Finally! ;)

>72 amanda4242: >71 PaulCranswick:

True enough - both the movies and the books got too dark and nonsensical,
making my daughter and I love the first ones even more.

Books of Blood Volume One by Clive Barker

I've been looking over various reviews of this collection and it seems like everyone has a different opinion on what the best and worst stories are, which surely says something about it's quality. I have my favorites, but I don't think there's a bad story in the lot and recommend it as an excellent introduction to Barker's horror writing.

"The Book of Blood"

We start with a very short framing story of the dead taking revenge upon a fake medium. It's only a few pages long, but it's well-realized and sets the perfect tone for the collection.

"The Midnight Meat Train"

An office drone stumbles into a nightmare of murder, cannibalism, and an ancient pact between the world above and the world below. It's probably the goriest of the stories (what else would you expect with a title like "Midnight Meat Train"?), but it's also one of the most complex.

"The Yattering and Jack"

A demon is sent to corrupt the soul of what appears to be the most boring and oblivious man on the planet. As the story progresses we discover that Jack is not as blind as he seems and is actually engaging in psychological warfare against the servant of Hell. There's a subtle humor to this one that makes it my favorite story in the collection.

"Pig Blood Blues"

A former police officer goes to work at a juvenile detention centre where some very hinky things are occuring. There's a tinge of folk horror to this one that gives it some interest, but it's my least favorite.

"Sex, Death and Starshine"

When a production of Twelfth Night is hampered by a famous but talentless leading lady, a mysterious benefactor comes forward to help improve things. An odd story of passions that survive death.

"In the Hills, The Cities"

Two bickering tourist are witness to a strange event: the inhabitants of two remote villages bind themselves together to form two giants and engage in ritual combat. I'm not sure I really get this one, but it has some very striking imagery.

Books of Blood {2020 movie} directed by Brannon Braga

This was originally intended to be an anthology mini-series, but was changed to an anthology film instead. There are three loosely connected tales, with only the middle one being actually based on one of Barker's stories. Two of the tales are bland an unmemorable; it's only the second tale, the one based on "The Books of Blood" story, that is truly worth watching.

Tales from the Darkside Season 4, Episode 7: "The Yattering and Jack" directed by David Odell

I wish I had some wine to pair with this cheese. Barker wrote the teleplay so the plot is very faithful, but everything is played for easy laughs so it's miles away from the spirit of the story.

The Midnight Meat Train {2008 film} directed by Ryûhei Kitamura

There are countless slasher movies out there about assholes doing stupid things and then being tortured to death in increasingly improbable ways, but thankfully The Midnight Meat Train is not one of them. The film expands on Barker's original tale just enough to make a full-length film, but it remains at heart the story of a decent guy who is just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

There are literally buckets of blood used onscreen, but this isn't torture porn: people die brutally, but very quickly. Still not for the squeamish, but it's a refreshing change of pace for those who don't mind violent horror.

Earlier this year I listened to the audiobook of Little Dorrit (1857) read by Simon Vance. I waited a while to watch the movie again, because I wanted to remember the audiobook experience.

Last night I finished watching the 2008 movie, screenplay by Andrew Davies. The performances were wonderful. But I was a bit disappointed in the ending, in that I felt it was rushed and some of the most moving scenes I remember from the audiobook were either cut short or completely eliminated from the screen adaptation. Still a powerful movie.

I read Agatha Christie's After the Funeral and then watched the adaptation starring David Suchet. This was one of Christie's mid-career books, and I didn't find her characterization and dialogue as sharp as it was earlier in her career, especially those of the younger characters. However, her plotting was as ingenious as ever. It seems the writer who adapted the screenplay had a similar reaction. Some of the characters were changed or eliminated. However, the details of the murder and the important clues were the same as the book. The screenwriter was wise not to mess with perfection. ;-)

>76 kac522: My current listen is narrated by Simon Vance. I'm finding him a wonderful reader.

>77 cbl_tn: I don't think I've ever actually seen an Agatha Christie adaptation. You'd think with the number of them available I would have caught one at some point, but nope.

The August thread is up!

https://www.librarything.com/topic/333954

>78 amanda4242: Yep, he's my favorite male reader, and Juliet Stevenson is my favorite female reader. Vance is particularly good with Dickens, where he comes up with different voices for each unusual Dickensian character.

Two more Jane Austen book/movie combinations to wrap up JA July and Book/Movie month. Both were re-reads & re-views:


Northanger Abbey: an annotated edition, annotated by Susan J. Wolfson, and watched the 2007 film with Felicity Jones. The book's annotations were a bit too detailed and long, and seemed to get away from the text. I always enjoy this movie version; Felicity Jones captures the essence of Catherine Morland for me. Andrew Davies did the screenplay.


Persuasion, audiobook read by Juliet Stevenson and watched the 1995 Persuasion with Amanda Root and Ciaran Hinds. I love this film; it's my favorite JA adaptation. You can just feel the electricity between Anne Elliot and Captain Wentworth, plus it has wonderful music that fits the movie.

Persuasion 1995 is my favorite among all the Jane Austen adaptations!

>82 cbl_tn: What I had forgotten is a very short scene near the end of the movie where Capt W. asks Anne (on behalf of the Crofts) if she will be needing Kellynch once she marries Mr. Elliot--she walks away frustrated and upset. I had forgotten about that scene, and it doesn't happen in the novel, which I had just re-read. What I vaguely recalled was something about an alternate ending, and indeed I found it in my annotated Persuasion edition. The "alternate" is actually Austen's original ending of 2 chapters, where Capt W. asks Anne if she'll need Kellynch, she immediately denies it, and they become reconciled right there.

The "revised" ending is 3 chapters long (the very last chapter is very similar in both versions). I definitely like the revised ending, with Anne's defense of a woman's love and Capt. W.'s passionate note.

According to my edition, the original ending is preserved in manuscript, the only original manuscript pages that survive of all of Austen's novels.

An omnibus of the first three All Creatures Great and Small books by James Herriot is on sale for $2.99.

https://openroadmedia.com/ebook/three-james-herriot-classics/9781453239407

Amazon Prime Video deals: Through August 29th Britbox, PBS Masterpiece, and Acorn are available for 99 cents a month for two months. All of the channels have a number of shows and movies that fit with the July theme.

In the past few days I've finished two books for this theme.

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke, which I've been meaning to read since it came out a decade and a half ago, and which I loved. This is the kind of book I really, really love to read, where you can't imagine what is going to happen and you're constantly pleasantly surprised by the storyline. So great.

I know there is a fairly recent TV mini series based on this book but haven't yet had the time to watch it.

It Shouldn't Happen to a Vet by James Herriot - the second of Herriot's autobiographical books about life as a country vet in Yorkshire during the middle of the last century. These books are short and sweet and full of Herriot's obvious love for his job, the place he lives in and the other people who live there.

As I mentioned after reading the first Herriot book, I have watched the most recent TV series earlier this year, and might get around to watching the older one one of these days.

>86 PawsforThought: I bought Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell when it came out in paperback and let it languish unread until a couple of years ago; after finishing it I was kicking myself for not reading such a wonderful book sooner! I re-read it last year and discovered it's even better the second time.

>87 amanda4242: I’m so glad I finally read it - it’s one of those books that you dream about. I don’t remember the last time I was this transfixed with a book, it’s such a rare thing. Most books are good, okay or even really good, but it isn’t often that I actually can’t put a book down.

And you say it’s better the second time? Whoa.

>88 PawsforThought: Since I knew where it was going I was able to slow down and pick up so many subtle little details I had missed before. It's such a richly detailed world that I think it's impossible to take it all in with only one reading.

You should also check out The Ladies of Grace Adieu, which has several stories set in the same world.

>89 amanda4242: Ooh, that sounds great, I’m definitely going to get my hands on that.

Look! Neil Gaiman and Susanna Clarke had a webinar yesterday (talking about Clarke's newest book) and it's on Youtube. Guess what I'll be watching this weekend...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o8I3ZKteVOE

>91 PawsforThought: Cool! Thanks!

By the away--this was an EXCELLENT theme, and hope it shows up next year (or something close to it!)

>93 kac522: Glad you've enjoyed it! I do have it penciled in as a potential for next year.

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight translated by Burton Raffel

This is the fourth or fifth time I've read this poem, so I think it's fair to say I adore it. It's magical and mysterious and macabre and mirthful. Raffel's translation isn't the most beautiful I've read, but it's clear and a pleasant read.

The Green Knight {2021 movie} directed by David Lowery

Drab, plodding, and so poorly lit that the Green Knight didn’t even look freaking green most of the time. Joel Edgerton was good and Dev Patel deserves an Oscar for how much he was able to make out of so little, but almost everyone else seemed to be sleepwalking through the movie.

Rikki-Tikki-Tavi by Rudyard Kipling

This is the story of the great war that Rikki-tikki-tavi fought single-handed, through the bath-rooms of the big bungalow in Segowlee cantonment.

Originally appearing in The Jungle Book, this short tale of a valiant mongoose and his battle with two cobras has always been a favorite of mine.

Rikki-Tikki-Tavi {1975 animated film} directed by Chuck Jones

And this animated short probably has a lot to do with my love of Kipling's story! Jones's animation is stunning, and imbues Rikki's movements with a sinuous energy. Top it off with narration by Orson Welles, and you have a small masterpiece.