There have been so many mediocre film adaptations of great novels which don’t even come close to capturing the magic of the original story. But there are quite a few gems out there and even though the book always comes first, it doesn’t necessarily mean that the film adaptations which follow are always completely inferior to the original work. Here is my list of the best book to film adaptations (where I have both read the book and seen the film).
We Need To Talk About Kevin (book by Lionel Shriver published in 2004, film directed by Lynne Ramsay released in 2011)
I loved this understated and creepy adaptation of ‘We Need to Talk About Kevin’. The sparse style and atmosphere of the film contrasts with the comparatively “wordy” text of the book but it works. The casting of Tilda Swinton and Ezra Miller as Eva and Kevin were both excellent choices.
‘A Heart So White’ by Javier Marías tells the story of a newly-married interpreter called Juan, and his complex relationship with his father, Ranz. The opening chapter is a six-page paragraph which recounts the suicide of a young woman who we later learn was Ranz’s first wife, the sister of Juan’s mother. The mystery surrounding these circumstances is gradually revealed through a number of other events. 
‘The Crimson Petal and the White’ by Michel Faber tells the story of Sugar, a nineteen year old prostitute living in London in the 1870s in a brothel run by her mother. She is ‘bought’ by William Rackham, a perfumer, to be his exclusive mistress – a situation which takes her life in unexpected directions. The stories of William’s disturbed wife, Agnes, and his pious brother, Henry, are also woven in to this rich tapestry of a story teeming with detail on all aspects of Victorian life. 
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I have reserved ‘Life After Life’ by Kate Atkinson 
‘Flight Behaviour’ by Barbara Kingsolver tells the story of Dellarobia Turnbow who climbs up a hillside in southern Appalachia on her way to meet her lover and stumbles across what appears to be a lake of orange fire. As we learn later, this is the arrival of millions of monarch butterflies which have been diverted from their usual destination of Mexico by the effects of climate change. A research team arrives to investigate but Dellarobia’s involvement in their work soon comes into conflict with all other aspects of her life, particularly her husband’s family who want to clear the land for logging. 
‘Blindness’ by José Saramago is a fable about an unexplained mass epidemic of blindness which has unsurprisingly chaotic consequences. The story begins with a man suddenly going blind as he is waiting in his car at some traffic lights. Several other characters who come into contact with him also lose their sight. The blind are quarantined in a mental asylum and left to fend for themselves but criminals soon gain control as society rapidly breaks down completely. Only the doctor’s wife is still able to see for unknown reasons but she doesn’t reveal this fact. Can she still help the others? 
Winner of the Orange Prize for Fiction and the Whitbread Book of the Year, ‘Small Island’ by Andrea Levy tells the story of Gilbert Joseph who emigrates to England in 1948 from Jamaica after fighting in the Second World War, shortly followed by his new wife, Hortense. Queenie Bligh has given up waiting for her husband, Bernard, to arrive home after fighting in the war, and takes in Gilbert and Hortense as lodgers to help make ends meet. However, when Bernard suddenly reappears, events become a lot more complicated. 
A Little Blog of Books 
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