This Academy Award season read the stories that inspired the film adaptations.
These Oscar-winning films have won over critics worldwide. It begs the question - Was the book better? Find your next read from the big screen.
The Must-See Epic FIlms Based on BookS
Ben Hur
by Lewis Wallace
Ben-Hur is better known as a film than as a novel. Rich in social parallels, Ben-Hur is both a great historical epic and a window into late nineteenth-century literature.
Gone with the Wind
by Margaret Mitchell
Since its original publication in 1936, Gone With the Wind is a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel heralded by readers everywhere as The Great American Novel.
The Godfather: 50th Anniversary Edition
by Mario Puzo
A #1 New York Times bestseller in 1969, Mario Puzo's epic was turned into the incomparable film of the same name, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, which won the Academy Award for Best Picture.
Doctor Zhivago
by Boris Pasternak
First published in Italy in 1957 amid international controversy, Doctor Zhivago is the story of the life and loves of a poet/physician during the turmoil of the Russian Revolution.
Dune
by Frank Herbert
The sci-fi movie based on the novel Dune by Frank Herbert stars Timothée Chalamet, Zendaya, Josh Brolin, Austin Butler, Florence Pugh, Christopher Walken, Javier Bardem, and more. A stunning blend of adventure and mysticism, environmentalism and politics, Dune is undoubtedly the grandest epic in science fiction.
Seven Pillars of Wisdom (Lawrence of Arabia)
by T E Lawrence
When T. E. Lawrence's Seven Pillars of Wisdom first appeared in 1922 it was immediately recognized as a literary masterpiece. In writing his extraordinary account of the Arab Revolt of 1916-1918 and his own role in it, T.E. Lawrence sealed his place in history and legend as Lawrence of Arabia.
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
by C S Lewis
Four adventurous siblings step through a wardrobe door and into the land of Narnia. This land is frozen in eternal winter and enslaved by the power of the White Witch. But when almost all hope is lost, the return of the Great Lion, Aslan, signals a great change . . . and a great sacrifice.
The Lord of the Rings
by J R R Tolkien
This collector's box brings together all three books in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings trilogy: The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King.
Patton: Ordeal and Triumph
by Ladislas Farago
Patton is America's most famous general and was an enigmatic figure. Victory during World War II was impossible without Patton, and returning to the field, his army was responsible for one of the most crushing advances in the history of warfare.
The Bridge Over the River Kwai
by Pierre Boulle
Boldly advancing through Asia, the Japanese need a train route from Burma going north. In a prison camp, British POWs are forced into labor. The bridge they build will become a symbol of service and survival to one prisoner.
Fight Back the Tears with These Emotional Novels
Little Women
by Louisa May Alcott
Little Women is the triumphant novel by Louisa May Alcott that has inspired nearly all who've read it. The inspiration for several major motion pictures, miniseries, plays, and more, discover the fantastical adventures set about by the memorable March sisters the world has come to love.
Terms of Endearment
by Larry McMurtry
Terms of Endearment is the Oscar-winning story of a memorable mother and her feisty daughter and their struggle to find the courage and humor to live through life's hazards and to love each other as never before.
The Whale
by Samuel D Hunter
Set in Moscow, Idaho, The Whale tells the story of a 600-pound obese man who hides from the world and stays in his apartment. He cannot stop eating, to the detriment of everyone around him, including his estranged daughter.
On the Waterfront
by Budd Schulberg
Building on his Academy Award-winning screenplay of the classic film, Budd Schulberg's On the Waterfront is the story of ex-prizefighter Terry Malloy's valiant stand against corruption on the New Jersey docks.
Schindler's List
by Thomas Keneally
During the Holocaust at the German concentration camp near Plaszow, thousands of Jews lost their lives at the hands of the Nazis. More than a thousand others would have been counted among the dead if not for a womanizing, heavy-drinking, German-Catholic industrialist and Nazi Party member named Oskar Schindler.
Still Alice
by Lisa Genova
Still Alice is a major motion picture starring Julianne Moore, Alec Baldwin, Kate Bosworth, and Kristen Stewart and follows a woman who slowly loses her thoughts and memories to Alzheimer's disease.
Spine-Chilling Tales
Frankenstein: The 1818 Text
by Mary Shelley - Charlotte Gordon - Charlotte Gordon - Charles E Robinson
Guillermo Del Toro's lavish adaptation of Mary Shelley's classic 1818 novel won three Oscars in 2026 for Production Design, Costume Design and Makeup and Hairstyling. While Jacob Elordi and Oscar Issac fully embodied Creature and Dr. Frankenstein, this classic is well-worth the read before or after watching the latest film adaptation.
Dracula
by Bram Stoker
Dracula has had a long-lasting influence on the gothic genre. It continues to scare and entertain readers who are brave enough to explore the world of bloodthirsty vampires.
The Silence of the Lambs
by Thomas Harris
Thomas Harris's The Silence of the Lambs is a classic of suspense and storytelling and the basis for the Oscar award-winning horror film starring Jodie Foster as Clarice Starling and Anthony Hopkins as Dr. Hannibal Lecter.
Misery
by Stephen King
Paul Sheldon is a bestselling novelist who has finally met his number-one fan. Her name is Annie Wilkes, and she is more than a rabid reader. Annie becomes his captor, keeping him prisoner in her isolated house.
Jaws
by Peter Benchley
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - The shark-versus-man classic that inspired the blockbuster Steven Spielberg movie
Rebecca
by Daphne Du Maurier
This novel has remained consistently in print since it was first published in 1938. It has frequently been adapted for television, radio, theater, and film. Most notably in 1940 by Alfred Hitchcock, whose Rebecca received the Academy Award for Best Picture.
The Exorcist
by William Peter Blatty
Originally published in 1971, The Exorcist remains one of the most controversial novels ever written. Soon after its publication, The Exorcist became a wildly popular motion picture, garnering ten Academy Award nominations.
Must-Read Before You Watch
All Quiet on the Western Front
by Erich Maria Remarque
The masterpiece of the German experience during World War I, considered by many the greatest war novel of all time--with an Oscar-winning film adaptation now streaming on Netflix.
To Kill a Mockingbird
by Harper Lee
Voted America's Best-Loved Novel in PBS's The Great American Read. Harper Lee's Pulitzer Prize-winning masterwork of honor and injustice in the deep South. Read about the heroism of one man in the face of blind and violent hatred
Midnight Cowboy
by James Leo Herlihy
The basis for the Oscar-winning buddy film. "There is no questioning the rampant power achieved through shriveling, shattering scenes" (Kirkus Reviews).
Cool Hand Luke
by Donn Pearce
"An impressive novel . . . the most brutal and authentic account of a road gang that we have had."--New York Times
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
by Ken Kesey
The movie won all five major Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Actress, Director, and Screenplay.
From Here to Eternity
by James Jones
It is one of the most important American novels to come out of World War II, a masterpiece that captures the honor and savagery of men.
How Green Was My Valley
by Richard Llewellyn
The international-bestselling winner of the National Book Award and the basis for the Academy Award-winning film directed by John Ford.
The Hustler
by Walter Tevis
The legendary novel from the bestselling author of The Queen's Gambit about an ambitious pool shark who discovers what it takes to make the big time. The basis for the acclaimed film starring Paul Newman.
The Lost Weekend
by Charles Jackson
The classic tale of one man's struggle with alcoholism, this revolutionary novel remains Charles Jackson's best-known book--a daring autobiographical work that paved the way for contemporary addiction literature.
It is 1936, and on the East Side of Manhattan, a would-be writer named Don Birnam decides to have a drink. And then another, and then another, until he's in the midst of what becomes a five-day binge. The Lost Weekend moves with unstoppable speed, propelled by a heartbreaking but unflinching truth. It catapulted Charles Jackson to fame, and endures as an acute study of the ravages of alcoholism, as well as an unforgettable parable of the condition of the modern man.
Your Favorite Male Lead Actors
The Revenant: A Novel of Revenge
by Michael Punke
A thrilling tale of betrayal and revenge set against the nineteenth-century American frontier, The Revenant is the astonishing story of real-life trapper and frontiersman Hugh Glass. Leonardo DiCaprio stars in the movie adaptation.
12 Years a Slave
by Solomon Northup
Solomon Northup wrote his memoir in 1853. He tells his story of being born free in New York, then kidnapped and made a slave for 12 years. Finally, he was freed and reunited with his family.
The Old Man and the Sea
by Ernest Hemingway
The last novel Ernest Hemingway saw published, The Old Man and the Sea has proved itself to be one of the enduring works of American fiction.
A Beautiful Mind
by Sylvia Nasar
The inspiration for the Academy Award-winning film starring Russell Crowe and Jennifer Connelly and directed by Ron Howard. This is the powerful biography of math genius John Nash, who overcame serious mental illness and schizophrenia to win the Nobel Prize.
No Country for Old Men
by Cormac McCarthy
One day, a good old boy named Llewellyn Moss finds a pickup truck surrounded by a bodyguard of dead men. A load of heroin and two million dollars in cash are still in the back. When Moss takes the money, he sets off a chain reaction of catastrophic violence that not even the law can contain.
Giant
by Edna Ferber
The basis for the classic film starring James Dean, Elizabeth Taylor, and Rock Hudson, Giant is Pulitzer Prize-winning author Edna Ferber's sweeping generational tale of power, love, cattle barons, and oil tycoons, set in Texas during the first half of the twentieth century.
Different Seasons (Shawshank Redemption)
by Stephen King
This gripping collection begins with "Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption," in which an unjustly imprisoned convict seeks a strange and startling revenge. The story is the basis for the Best Picture Academy Award-nominee The Shawshank Redemption.
Forrest Gump
by Winston Groom
The modern classic that inspired the beloved movie starring Tom Hanks.
Dances with Wolves
by Michael Blake
Ordered to hold an abandoned army post, John Dunbar found himself alone, beyond the edge of civilization. Thievery and survival soon forced him into the Indian camp, where he began a dangerous adventure that changed his life forever. Relive the adventure and beauty of the incredible movie starring Kevin Costner.
Your Favorite Lead Female Actors
Hamnet
by Maggie O'Farrell
Despite being named after Shakespeare's 11-year-old son who tragically died due to the Plague, Hamnet isn't the real star of this novel by award-winning Irish author Maggie O'Farrell. Actress Jessie Buckley was awarded an Oscar for her deeply moving portrayal of Shakespeare's wife Agnes, a woman with a wild streak and a natural gift as a healer. This historical novel takes a mesmerizing look at the years leading up to the Bard's most famous play, Hamlet.
Women Talking
by Miriam Toews
The basis of the Oscar-winning film from writer/director Sarah Polley, starring Rooney Mara, Claire Foy, Jessie Buckley, with Ben Whishaw and Frances McDormand. Based on real events, Toews's masterful novel uses wry humor to relate this tale of women claiming their own power to decide.
Emma
by Jane Austen
From what acclaimed novelist Jane Austen wrongly suspected was the least-liked of her protagonists comes a character unlike any other. Emma is the story of a fiercely independent young woman who defines the boundaries of what a conventional lady was supposed to resemble in 19th century Britain.
Million Dollar Baby
by F X Toole
This hard-hitting collection of powerful and moving tales based on the experiences of the late, great fight manager and cutman Jerry Boyd is the basis for the Oscar-winning motion picture starring Hilary Swank and Morgan Freeman.
The Hours
by Michael Cunningham
The Pulitzer Prize-winning novel that became a motion picture starring Meryl Streep, Julianne Moore, and Nicole Kidman.
The Help
by Kathryn Stockett
The #1 New York Times bestselling novel and basis for the Academy Award-winning film. It is a timeless and universal story about the lines we abide by, and the ones we don't. Nominated as one of America's best-loved novels by PBS's The Great American Read.
Room
by Emma Donoghue
The award-winning bestseller became one of the most talked about and memorable novels and movies of the decade. Held captive for years in a small shed, a woman and her precocious young son finally gain their freedom, and the boy experiences the outside world for the first time.
Mrs Harris Goes to Paris & Mrs Harris Goes to New York
by Paul Gallico
The delightful, uplifting story of Mrs. Harris, an ordinary woman whose life is transformed by one beautiful dress. Now a motion picture starring Lesley Manville and Isabelle Huppert.
Mrs. Miniver
by Jan Struther
Jan Struther was asked to contribute a series imagining the life of an "ordinary" woman, although her definition of "ordinary" was doubtless a reflection of her own background. Mrs Miniver has both a town and a country house, with servants in both.
Nomadland
by Jessica Bruder
Employers have found a cheap labor source in older Americans who move around a lot. These people often don't have enough money from social security and struggle to pay their mortgages. They have started living on the road in RVs, trailers, and vans, forming a community of nomads.
Sing Along with These Heartwarming Musical Hits
Anna and the King of Siam
by Margaret Landon
The bestselling book that inspired the musical play and film The King and I
Pygmalion
by George Bernard Shaw
Of all of George Bernard Shaw's plays, Pygmalion has been the most enduring. Based on the Greek Classical myth, this work is both extremely witty and psychologically penetrating. Composed in five acts, the play examines social and ethical issues and the inherent flaws of human interactions.
Mary Poppins
by P L Travers
This classic novel continues to enchant readers of all ages! A day with Mary Poppins is a day of magic and make-believe come to life.
Gigi, Julie de Carneilhan, and Chance Acquaintances
by Colette
Perhaps Colette's best-known work, Gigi is the story of a young girl being raised in a household more concerned with success and money than with the desires of the heart.
Oliver Twist
by Charles Dickens
Oliver Twist begins in a workhouse north of London where a young orphan named Oliver lives a brutal and impoverished life and is subjected to a series of torments as he is handed off to an undertaker to work as a mourner at funerals. After a succession of maltreatments, Oliver runs away to London for a better life.
The Story of the Trapp Family Singers
by Maria A Trapp
With five Academy Awards, The Sound of Music, based on the lives of Maria, the baron, and their singing children, is as familiar to most of us as our own family history.
Courtrooms, Cops, Crimes, and Corruption Book-to-Screen Adaptations
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
by Stieg Larsson
ONE OF TIME MAGAZINE'S 100 BEST MYSTERY AND THRILLER BOOKS OF ALL TIME
Mystic River
by Dennis Lehane
This New York Times bestseller is a gripping, unnerving psychological thriller about the effects of a savage killing on three former friends in a tightly knit, blue-collar Boston neighborhood.
In the Heat of the Night
by John Ball
"They call me Mr. Tibbs" was the line immortalized by Sidney Poitier in the 1967 Oscar-winning movie adaptation of In the Heat of the Night, which won the Edgar Award for Best First Novel and the Crime Writers' Association Gold Dagger Award and was named one of the 100 Favorite Mysteries of the 20th Century by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association.
All the King's Men
by Robert Penn Warren
WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE - The fully restored original text of the classic, ever-relevant story of a backcountry lawyer whose idealism is overcome by his lust for power--American literature's definitive political novel.
Kramer vs. Kramer
by Avery Corman
The best-selling, groundbreaking novel adapted into the Academy Award-winning Best Picture starring Dustin Hoffman and Meryl Streep, winner of five Academy Awards.
Dead Man Walking
by Helen Prejean
Sean Penn and Susan Sarandon star in this adaptation directed by Tim Robbins.
The French Connection
by Robin Moore
The gripping account of an extraordinary international narcotics case, as it unfolds on the streets of New York City.
Academy Award-Winning Movies with Romance
A Room with a View
by E M Forster
Known to many through Merchant Ivory's lush 1985 film adaptation, which won multiple awards including the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay, the novel provides an even richer experience.
If Beale Street Could Talk
by James Baldwin
A stunning love story about a young Black woman whose life is torn apart when her lover is wrongly accused of a crime – "a moving, painful story, so vividly human and so obviously based on reality that it strikes us as timeless" (The New York Times Book Review).
Atonement
by Ian McEwan
A symphonic novel of love and war, childhood and class, guilt and forgiveness that provides all the satisfaction of a brilliant narrative and the provocation we have come to expect from the acclaimed Booker Prize-winning, internationally bestselling author.
Out of Africa
by Isak Dinesen
The movie with Robert Redford and Meryl Streep won seven Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director.
The English Patient
by Michael Ondaatje
This adaptation won nine Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Supporting Actress for Juliette Binoche.
These Feature Films hosted an All-Star Cast
Vineland (the Inspiration for One Battle After Another)
by Thomas Pynchon
Thomas Pynchon's Vineland is the inspiration behind the Oscar-winning film One Battle After Another. Its all-star cast reeled in six Oscars for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Supporting Actor, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Editing. In fact, the lineup was so good, that One Battle After Another won the first ever award for Achievement in Casting.
Around the World in Eighty Days
by Jules Verne
A classic tale of adventure by renowned French author Jules Verne.
Grand Hotel
by Vicki Baum
A famous hotel in 1920s Berlin represents the whole world in this famous book. It was made into a movie in 1932, starring Greta Garbo and John Barrymore, and won an Oscar.
Ordinary People
by Judith Guest
This novel inspired Robert Redford's Oscar-winning film starring Donald Sutherland and Mary Tyler Moore.
Foreign Favorites
Foster
by Claire Keegan
Claire Keegan's piercing contemporary classic Foster is a heartbreaking story of childhood, loss, and love.
Life of Pi
by Yann Martel
Life of Pi is at once a realistic, adventure and a tale of survival that explores the redemptive power of storytelling and the transformative nature of fiction.
Peek into the Past with these Academy Award-winning book-to-screen Adaptations
Amadeus
by Peter Shaffer
Amadeus won eight Oscars, including Best Picture. Amadeus is a must-have for classical music buffs, theatre lovers, and fans of historical fiction.
The Cider House Rules
by John Irving
"AN OLD-FASHIONED, BIG-HEARTED NOVEL...with its epic yearning caught in the 19th century, somewhere between Trollope and Twain...The rich detail makes for vintage Irving." – The Boston Sunday Globe
Cimarron
by Edna Ferber
This book is the basis for the Academy Award-winning major motion picture.
Gentleman's Agreement
by Laura Z Hobson
The film version won three Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Supporting Actress, and Best Director.
Glory for Me (The Best Years of Our Lives)
by MacKinlay Kantor
Pulitzer Prize-winning author and basis for the movie - "The Best Years of Our Lives."
Memoirs of a Geisha
by Arthur Golden
In "Memoirs of a Geisha," we enter a world where appearances are paramount. In this place, a girl's virginity is sold to the highest bidder. Women are taught to charm influential men, while love is dismissed as an illusion.
Is it true that classic books make the best films?
Howards End
by E M Forster
E.M. Forster's Howards End is a masterpiece, a brilliant study of family, wealth, romance, and secrecy. It captures the depravity of the English aristocracy without losing what sets it apart the undeterred sense of humanity.
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
by Lewis Carroll
One moment Alice is sitting along the banks of a river admiring the wind, the next she is tumbling down a rabbit hole. Far away from the life she was used to, Alice's adventures in the fantastical, and oh-so-strange, Wonderland is delightfully bizarre and tremendously entertaining.
Mutiny on the Bounty
by Charles Nordhoff - James Norman Hall
Mutiny on the Bounty is a thrilling story set in the South Pacific. It revolves around betrayal and survival. This captivating tale appeals to readers of all ages.
Sense and Sensibility
by Jane Austen
Set in London at the turn of the 18th century, The Dashwood family is on the verge of financial ruin after the death of their father. Forced to pack up their belongings and relinquish their comfortable lifestyle, Mrs. Dashwood and her three daughters, move in with their distant relatives the Middeltons, at Barton Park. There, they must each adapt to a new, more sensible way of life.
The History of Tom Jones
by Henry Fielding
The History of Tom Jones is Henry Fielding's greatest work and one of literature's earliest examples of a fully realized protagonist, with both virtues and vices on abundant display.
The Great Gatsby
by F Scott Fitzgerald
Adapted into several influential films and adored by generations of readers and writers, The Great Gatsby is not only Fitzgerald's crowning achievement but one of the finest novels ever written.