We’re giving our book club a cinematic twist this month. From lighthearted rom com to darker dystopia, we’ve got a book for any kind of club meeting you’re after. The twist here is that all of these tomes have been turned into a show or movie. In addition to the usual book chat, we can only imagine you’ll get to dissecting good and bad casting decisions, deviations from the source material, and more. If you’ve not seen the show or film, pull up an ottoman, pick your pairing, and check it off your watch list. And, of course, we’ll want to know what you think: Which was better, the book or the movie? (We bet you know where we stand on most of the below!)
If you’re a cynic when it comes to love
The Perfect Couple
by Elin Hilderbrand
From New York Times bestselling author Elin Hilderbrand comes a "quintessential summer read" (People) about the many ways family can fill our lives with love – if they don't kill us first.
It's Nantucket wedding season, also known as summer – the sight of a bride racing down Main Street is as common as the sun setting at Madaket Beach. The Otis-Winbury wedding promises to be an event to remember: the groom's wealthy parents have spared no expense to host a lavish ceremony at their oceanfront estate. But it's going to be memorable for all the wrong reasons after tragedy strikes: a body is discovered in Nantucket Harbor just hours before the ceremony – and everyone in the wedding party is suddenly a suspect. As Chief of Police Ed Kapenash interviews the bride, the groom, the groom's famous mystery-novelist mother, and even a member of his own family, he discovers that every wedding is a minefield-and no couple is perfect. Featuring beloved characters from The Castaways, Beautiful Day, and A Summer Affair, The Perfect Couple proves once again that Elin Hilderbrand is the queen of the summer beach read.
The adaptation: The newest adaptation on this list is a series starring Nicole Kidman and Liev Schreiber and promises plenty of drama on the island of Nantucket.
The pairing: A Sauvignon Blanc with a touch of salinity
If you like to belt it out with the best of ‘em
Daisy Jones & the Six
by Taylor Jenkins Reid
A gripping novel about the whirlwind rise of an iconic 1970s rock group and their beautiful lead singer, revealing the mystery behind their infamous breakup – from the author of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Malibu Rising, and Carrie Soto Is Back.
Everyone knows DAISY JONES & THE SIX, but nobody knows the reason behind their split at the absolute height of their popularity . . . until now.
Daisy is a girl coming of age in L.A. in the late sixties, sneaking into clubs on the Sunset Strip, sleeping with rock stars, and dreaming of singing at the Whisky a Go Go. The sex and drugs are thrilling, but it's the rock 'n' roll she loves most. By the time she's twenty, her voice is getting noticed, and she has the kind of heedless beauty that makes people do crazy things.
Also getting noticed is The Six, a band led by the brooding Billy Dunne. On the eve of their first tour, his girlfriend Camila finds out she's pregnant, and with the pressure of impending fatherhood and fame, Billy goes a little wild on the road. Daisy and Billy cross paths when a producer realizes that the key to supercharged success is to put the two together. What happens next will become the stuff of legend.
The making of that legend is chronicled in this riveting and unforgettable novel, written as an oral history of one of the biggest bands of the seventies. Taylor Jenkins Reid is a talented writer who takes her work to a new level with Daisy Jones & The Six, brilliantly capturing a place and time in an utterly distinctive voice.
The adaptation: The miniseries adaptation that put Riley Keough front and center is a sleeper hit that is well worth your attention — once you make your way over to it.
The pairing: A Zweigelt with a little rock and roll edge to it
If you’re the type to spy out your window
Little Fires Everywhere
by Celeste Ng
The #1 New York Times bestseller - Named a Best Book of the Year by People, The Washington Post, Bustle, Esquire, Southern Living, The Daily Beast, GQ, Entertainment Weekly, NPR, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iBooks, Audible, Goodreads, Library Reads, Book of the Month, Paste, Kirkus Reviews, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and more
From the bestselling author of Everything I Never Told You and Our Missing Hearts comes a riveting novel that traces the intertwined fates of the picture-perfect Richardson family and the enigmatic mother and daughter who upend their lives.
In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is planned – from the layout of the winding roads, to the colors of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules.
Enter Mia Warren – an enigmatic artist and single mother – who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenaged daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past and a disregard for the status quo that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community.
When old family friends of the Richardsons attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town – and puts Mia and Elena on opposing sides. Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Elena is determined to uncover the secrets in Mia's past. But her obsession will come at unexpected and devastating costs.
Little Fires Everywhere explores the weight of secrets, the nature of art and identity, and the ferocious pull of motherhood – and the danger of believing that following the rules can avert disaster.
The adaptation: Talk about perfect pairings! This miniseries brought Reese Witherspoon and Kerry Washington together on a screen almost too small to hold all that star power.
The pairing: A classic and era-perfect Merlot
If you don’t fear a little dystopia
The Handmaid's Tale
by Margaret Atwood
It is the world of the near future, and Offred is a Handmaid in the home of the Commander and his wife. She is allowed out once a day to the food market, she is not permitted to read, and she is hoping the Commander makes her pregnant, because she is only valued if her ovaries are viable. Offred can remember the years before, when she was an independent woman, had a job of her own, a husband and child. But all of that is gone now...everything has changed. Deserves the highest praise. – "San Francisco Chronicle"
The adaptation: Elisabeth Moss as June Osborne, aka Offred, stunned us in this spectacular (and author-blessed) adaptation of the classic novel. It’s no less than an absolute modern television masterpiece in our opinion.
The Pairing: A very clutchable and gulpable Gamay
If you think a May-December romance is just the thing
The Idea of You
by Robinne Lee
When Solène Marchand, the thirty-nine-year-old owner of a prestigious art gallery in Los Angeles, takes her daughter, Isabelle, to meet her favorite boy band, she does so reluctantly and at her ex-husband's request. The last thing she expects is to make a connection with one of the members of the world-famous August Moon. But Hayes Campbell is clever, winning, confident, and posh, and the attraction is immediate. That he is all of twenty years old further complicates things.
What begins as a series of clandestine trysts quickly evolves into a passionate relationship. It is a journey that spans continents as Solène and Hayes navigate each other's disparate worlds: from stadium tours to international art fairs to secluded hideaways in Paris and Miami. And for Solène, it is as much a reclaiming of self, as it is a rediscovery of happiness and love. When their romance becomes a viral sensation, and both she and her daughter become the target of rabid fans and an insatiable media, Solène must face how her new status has impacted not only her life, but the lives of those closest to her.
The adaptation: Anne Hathaway and Nicholas Galitzine are as sexy as they are sweet in this touching movie about a single mom’s fateful run-in with the lead singer of a soaring boy band.
The pairing: Chardonnay all the way for a love affair like this.
If you like some drama with your mama
Big Little Lies
by Liane Moriarty
A murder . . . A tragic accident . . . Or just parents behaving badly? What's indisputable is that someone is dead.
Madeline is a force to be reckoned with. She's funny, biting, and passionate; she remembers everything and forgives no one. Celeste is the kind of beautiful woman who makes the world stop and stare but she is paying a price for the illusion of perfection. New to town, single mom Jane is so young that another mother mistakes her for a nanny. She comes with a mysterious past and a sadness beyond her years. These three women are at different crossroads, but they will all wind up in the same shocking place.
Big Little Lies is a brilliant take on ex-husbands and second wives, mothers and daughters, schoolyard scandal, and the little lies that can turn lethal.
The adaptation: A who’s-who of contemporary, female Hollywood royalty makes up a cast that you just can’t take your eyes off of, in this gripping two-season series.
The pairing: Albarino in all its coastal glory.
If you know they’re out there
The Three-Body Problem
by Cixin Liu
The Three-Body Problem is the first novel in the groundbreaking, Hugo Award-winning series from China's most beloved science fiction author, Cixin Liu.
Set against the backdrop of China's Cultural Revolution, a secret military project sends signals into space to establish contact with aliens. An alien civilization on the brink of destruction captures the signal and plans to invade Earth. Meanwhile, on Earth, different camps start forming, planning to either welcome the superior beings and help them take over a world seen as corrupt, or to fight against the invasion. The result is a science fiction masterpiece of enormous scope and vision.
The adaptation: Also new to the adaptation repertoire, this show has had one out-of-this world season so far — and we’ve got our fingers crossed that it keeps on going.
The pairing: A stellar and newish-to-many Cannonau
If you know love is never simple
After Ever Happy
by Anna Todd
Anna Todd's After fanfiction racked up 1 billion reads online and captivated readers across the globe. Experience the internet's most talked-about book for yourself from the writer Cosmopolitan called "the biggest literary phenomenon of her generation."
Tessa and Hardin have defied all the odds, but will their fairy tale ending be turned on its head? AFTER EVER HAPPY . . . Life will never be the same. #HESSA
It's never been all rainbows and sunshine for Tessa and Hardin, but each new challenge they've faced has only made their passionate bond stronger and stronger. But when a revelation about the past shakes Hardin's inpenetrable façade to the core – and then Tessa suffers a tragedy – will they stick together again, or be torn apart?
As the shocking truth about each of their families emerges, it's clear the two lovers are not so different from each other. Tessa is no longer the sweet, simple, good girl she was when she met Hardin – any more than he is the cruel, moody boy she fell so hard for. Tessa understands all the troubling emotions brewing beneath Hardin's exterior, and she knows she's the only one who can calm him when he erupts. He needs her.
But the more layers of his past come to light, the darker he grows, and the harder he pushes Tessa – and everyone else in his life – away. Tessa's not sure if she really can save him – not without sacrificing herself. She refuses to go down without a fight. But who is she fighting for – Hardin or herself?
The adaptation: The sequel to “After We Fell” keeps the heat and drama going in this full-length film.
The pairing: You’ll want a bubbly Prosecco to help keep the pace.
If you need a serious chuckle
Is This Anything?
by Jerry Seinfeld
The first book in twenty-five years from "one of our great comic minds" (The Washington Post) features Seinfeld's best work across five decades in comedy.
Since his first performance at the legendary New York nightclub "Catch a Rising Star" as a twenty-one-year-old college student in fall of 1975, Jerry Seinfeld has written his own material and saved everything. "Whenever I came up with a funny bit, whether it happened on a stage, in a conversation, or working it out on my preferred canvas, the big yellow legal pad, I kept it in one of those old school accordion folders," Seinfeld writes. "So I have everything I thought was worth saving from forty-five years of hacking away at this for all I was worth."
For this book, Jerry Seinfeld has selected his favorite material, organized decade by decade. In this "trove of laugh-out-loud one-liners" (Associated Press), you will witness the evolution of one of the great comedians of our time and gain new insights into the thrilling but unforgiving art of writing stand-up comedy.
The adaptation: Take your pick of any of the 180 episodes of “Seinfeld,” which ran from 1989 to 1998 — none of which, it somehow seems, ever get stale.
The pairing: A Mouton Cadet, of course.
If you Want to feel like a kid again
As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales from the Making of the Princess Bride
by Cary Elwes
From actor Cary Elwes, who played the iconic role of Westley in The Princess Bride, comes the New York Times bestselling account of the making of the cult classic film filled with never-before-told stories, exclusive photographs, and interviews with costars Robin Wright, Wallace Shawn, Billy Crystal, Christopher Guest, and Mandy Patinkin, as well as author and screenwriter William Goldman, producer Norman Lear, and director Rob Reiner.
The Princess Bride has been a family favorite for close to three decades. Ranked by the American Film Institute as one of the top 100 Greatest Love Stories and by the Writers Guild of America as one of the top 100 screenplays of all time, The Princess Bride will continue to resonate with audiences for years to come.
Cary Elwes was inspired to share his memories and give fans an unprecedented look into the creation of the film while participating in the twenty-fifth anniversary cast reunion. In As You Wish he has created an enchanting experience; in addition to never-before seen photos and interviews with his fellow cast mates, there are plenty of set secrets and backstage stories.
With a foreword by Rob Reiner and a limited edition original poster by acclaimed artist Shepard Fairey, As You Wish is a must-have for all fans of this beloved film.
The adaptation: We will never stop watching “The Princess Bride” at least annually for so long as we shall live. Never seen it? Fix that problem now. Seen it before? This is your sign to watch it again.
The pairing: A robust and goblet-worthy Cabernet Sauvignon.