From Netflix, to Amazon Prime, to Hulu, movies and television are a large part of society today. But what about books? It seems people now don’t read as much as they used to. Many books have been turned into movies and TV shows, such as “Twilight”, “Harry Potter”, “Divergent”, “The 100”, “Outlander”, and even “The Vampire Diaries”. Here are some upcoming movies and shows based on some great books.

The “Percy Jackson” series is becoming a series on Disney +. “Percy Jackson” is about 11-year-old Percy being thrust into the world of Greek Mythology, except it’s not just a myth. It’s real, and he is a demigod, his father being Poseidon. Readers follow him through a five-book series. 

      Not much information on the show has been released yet, but here’s what we know. On June 15th, author of the books, Rick Riordan, released a statement on Instagram saying they are still in the early stages and are still writing the pilot, which means there is no confirmed cast or episodes ready for the public at this time. People have speculated that there will be five seasons, one season for every book.

        All we can do is hope the series is better than the movies they originally tried to do. The movie directors cut out more than several scenes from the book, which may I add, made no sense whatsoever as to why they couldn’t just do the original scenes instead of something extravagant. On top of that, the characters did not look the way they should. The characters are supposed to be between 11-16 years old, so why do they look 20 years old? Why do their physical appearances such as hair and such not match up? I am definitely excited to see something more accurate to the books. 

“Shadow and Bone” is a show that is essentially across between two series by Leigh Bardugo, ¨Six of Crows¨ and ¨Crooked Kingdom¨. It has characters from both series in the show and it is confirmed that the show will be on Netflix as soon as it comes out. There is a confirmed cast, but the release date is unknown due to extra filming days because of the coronavirus. Among the confirmed would be Ben Barnes as General Kirigan, and Freddy Carter as Kaz Brekker.

      Many estimate the coming out around the end of this year or early 2021 the latest. Author of the books, Leigh Bardugo says the show will be massively different from the books. It is confirmed that the first season will have eight episodes. The author Leigh Bardugo said ¨Episode 7 was the one for me that was like, It was—it was so purely what I had in my head and my heart that it was pretty extraordinary to see it¨. I cannot wait to see the end result.

In elementary school we read a lot of books, but one of my favorites was “Witches” by Ronald Dahl. This story is about a coven of witches going to a hotel the same time as our main character, the narrator. These are not regular witches though; these witches hate children. We follow the narrator throughout the book as he is trying to deceive the witches. 

        Now in 1990, “Witches” was already made into a movie, but who doesn’t love remakes…right? Director Robert Zemeckis has produced a remake which was released at the end of October, starring the one and only Anne Hathaway! The new film was met with mixed reviews, but your opinion is the only one that counts! 

What do you think about these books being turned into these movies and shows? Do you prefer the books or the movies and TV show versions? Think about these things when you watch!