Bright Sunny Day

Hello all you wonderful people. It's a gorgeous day outside (at least where I am) and baseball is on tv. Grilling will take place later today (my first attempt at barbecue chicken) and maybe even a walk. But the weather is not what I wanted to address today (although I did think I would let you know how beautiful it is outside). I was recently reading an interview that I got in a Goodreads.com newsletter from October - I am always far behind in my reading it seems - and the interview was with Audrey Niffenegger (the author of "The Time Traveler's Wife"). In this interview, she was talking about her newest book entitled "Her Fearful Symmetry". She was also asked whether she had seen the film adaptation of her book "The Time Traveler's Wife". She stated that she had not and that she didn't really have an interest in seeing it. At the end of the interview, people left comments about what they thought about that decision and what they would do. It in turn made me think about what I would do if I had a book published and then made into a movie.

First of all, I'm not sure that I would want my book to be made into a movie. I believe that when books are read, we create our own picture in our mind of what things look like and what the characters are like. I think that seeing a movie adaptation would wreck my imaginary world that I created in my mind for the story.

Second of all, I have noticed that in many interviews with authors that they claim that the movie didn't follow the actual story, but decided to change things around, or add things to the story to try and make it more mainstream to a point where it would draw a lot of people, which would draw a lot of money. Not only are some authors voicing their opinions about this subject, but a certain football player made a statement when a movie was created about him and his family. The movie was "The Blind Side" and the person that was portrayed was Michael Oher, who has an incredible story to share, but there was one thing in the movie that wasn't true. In an interview with Oher shortly after the movie came out, he stated that there was an inconsistency in the movie. In the movie, Michael Oher is portrayed as not having played football until high school and had to be taught to get that toughness that was portrayed so well in the film. As stated by Oher himself, he knew how to play football before high school and he was taught at a much younger age. That is one great example of a movie changing some aspect of a story in order to bring in a bigger audience.

So I propose this question to you: If you were an author, what would you do? Would you allow your work to be made into a movie, and if so, would you see it?

As always, I will be answering my last posts question and proposing a new one to you. My question from my last post was: Do you ever check out any sites that are devoted to books or reading? If so, what sites do you look at?

Answer: I do look at some sites that are devoted to reading. Goodreads.com is a great site as is weread.com. These sites allow for people to not only join in a community of book lovers, but it allows people to experience new books from new writers.

Now for the question I am posing to you this week (you get two questions since I gave you the one above as well). In three words, describe what is currently running through your mind, and if you would like to, explain what each word means since it is running through your mind.

Peace and Love