From BookTok to box office: latest and upcoming popular reads adapted for film and TV

Emily Brontë’s haunting gothic romance gets the Emerald Fennell treatment in Wuthering Heights. The director has made it clear this isn’t a straightforward adaptation. Instead, she describes the film as her own interpretation of the novel as she first encountered it at 14. It stars Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi, two of today's hottest (literally and figuratively) stars, as Catherine and Heathcliff, permitted to act on their carnal desires.                                                       

There’s been plenty of BookTok chatter surrounding the film, from the casting and the costumes to the plot and the press tour. Is it good or is it bad? Critics and audiences can’t seem to make up their minds. What it is, though, is steamy, provocative and decidedly Fennell-coded.

See more: 7 must-watch ‘Wuthering Heights’ adaptations

The first Emily Henry adaptation out of the gate is People We Meet on Vacation, her second adult romance novel (there are five more, all lined up for their screen adaptations, including Beach Read starring Bridgerton’s Phoebe Dynevor). In what BookTok fans are calling the perfect casting, the film stars Tom Blyth and Emily Bader as Alex and Poppy, best friends who make a pact to travel together every summer. 

They may claim they’re just platonic travel buddies, but stolen glances, whispered promises and quiet yearning say otherwise. Like all great rom-coms, there will be misunderstandings and missed opportunities, but there will also be steamy makeout scenes in the rain and grand confessions of love.

See more: 7 summer fling novels to read if you liked ‘People We Meet on Vacation’

Another top BookTok choice that made it to the big screen is Freida McFadden’s 2022 psychological thriller The Housemaid. Paul Feig, who helmed both A Simple Favour films, takes on directorial duties and delivers another female-led, mind-bending suspense drama.

Starring Sydney Sweeney as the housemaid Millie, Amanda Seyfried as her seemingly unhinged employer Nina and Brandon Sklenar as Nina’s husband Andrew, the film takes viewers on a rollercoaster ride full of twists, turns and shocking revelations.

Other McFadden book adaptations reportedly already in development include The Housemaid’s Secret, The Tenant, The Teacher, Dear Debbie and The Surrogate Mother.

See more: Sydney Sweeney takes on domestic abuse in ‘The Housemaid’—here’s why it’s important

Fans have only seen the teaser so far, but that has not stopped them from dissecting every frame on BookTok, comparing it with the original films, discussing the casting and celebrating news of an Everdeen cameo. They all can’t wait to meet Leonore Dove, Maysilee and Wyatt, and are looking forward to seeing the younger versions of Wiress, Beetee, Mags and Plutarch. 

Sunrise on the Reaping is the second Hunger Games prequel novel to be adapted for the big screen, following 2023’s box-office hit The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Set 24 years before audiences first meet Katniss Everdeen, the story unfolds during the 50th Hunger Games, also known as the Second Quarter Quell, and explores the backstory of Haymitch Abernathy, Katniss’s abrasive mentor.

A BookTok sensation, Ali Hazelwood’s The Love Hypothesis began life as a Rey Skywalker-Kylo Ren fan fiction before being reinvented as a STEM-set romance. The story leans into the fake-relationship trope, following Olive Smith (Lili Reinhart), a third-year PhD student, and Adam Carlsen (Tom Bateman), a grumpy hotshot professor, as they navigate academia and their slow-burn romance.

In a delightfully meta twist that has fans buzzing, Tom Bateman is married to Daisy Ridley, the actress behind Rey Skywalker in the Star Wars films. BookTok fans also can’t get enough of the clever little marketing campaign that Lili Reinhart has rolled out on TikTok, not only jumping on the latest trends, but even starting one that undoubtedly found its way to your FYP.

Among Colleen Hoover’s many novels slated for adaptation, Verity is perhaps the most highly anticipated. Often described as a compulsive read, the story follows a struggling writer hired by bestselling author Verity Crawford’s husband to complete her unfinished works after Verity is left incapacitated in a car accident.

The ambiguous ending inspired spirited debates on BookTok and divided readers into Team Letter vs Team Manuscript. But beyond the book’s shocking plot twist, fan excitement for the film adaptation is also thanks in part to a star-studded cast that includes Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson and Josh Hartnett.

Like Emily Henry, Freida McFadden and Colleen Hoover, bestselling author Taylor Jenkins-Reid has several novels in various stages of adaptation. Following Prime Video’s hit series Daisy Jones & the Six, next in line is the eagerly awaited Netflix film adaptation of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo.

A BookTok phenomenon, the novel has inspired endless fancasting debates online. Popular picks for Evelyn Hugo include Ana de Armas and Eiza González, while Jessica Chastain, who has since confirmed she is not attached to the project, was long considered a frontrunner for the older Celia St James, with Sadie Sink frequently suggested for the younger Celia. As for the husbands, fan favourites range from Andrew Garfield and Jacob Elordi to Dev Patel and Henry Golding.

Based on the New York Times bestselling novel by Maggie O’Farrell, Hamnet is a fictional retelling of William Shakespeare and wife Agnes Hathaway’s life together, and how they deal with the death of their 11-year-old son Hamnet. It’s an emotional tale that speaks to the power of art to help people make sense of tragic loss.

Rich with symbolism and evocative imagery, director Chloé Zhao’s soulful meditation on grief has garnered eight Oscar nominations this year, including a Best Actress nod for Jessie Buckley’s quietly devastating performance as Agnes.

See more: Chloé Zhao’s ‘Hamnet’ review: an epic about love, loss and the spaces in between

A popular BookTok recommendation, the film adaptation of Andy Weir’s Project Hail Mary stars Ryan Gosling as a sixth-grade science teacher who is sent to space on a Hail Mary mission to save Earth from imminent destruction. There, he meets an unlikely partner—an alien whose planet faces the same demise as Earth’s. Together, they must find a way to work together and MacGyver a solution before time runs out. Yes, it’s science fiction (heavy on the science), but more than the cool, real-world physics and chemistry featured in the book, what really stays with the readers is the humour and heart at the centre of the story.

Over a decade after Keira Knightley’s Elizabeth Bennet rejected the most appalling marriage proposal and Matthew Macfadyen’s Mr Darcy famously flexed his hand, Netflix is bringing a fresh adaptation of Pride and Prejudice to the screen. The six-part series will star The Crown’s Emma Corrin as Elizabeth opposite Benediction’s Jack Lowden as Darcy. Also in the cast are Olivia Colman, Rufus Sewell and Louis Partridge.

The Knightley-Macfadyen adaptation is huge on TikTok, and only time will tell if this new take on the Jane Austen classic will be the subject of future fan edits. Maybe Lowden can throw in a hand flex or emerge from a lake fully clothed a la Colin Firth in the 1995 BBC adaptation of Pride and Prejudice...or do whatever the Gen Z version of these are.

The 1995 adaptation of Sense and Sensibility, directed by Ang Lee from a screenplay by Emma Thompson, and starring Thompson, Kate Winslet, Hugh Grant and Alan Rickman, is as close as one can get to a perfect Jane Austen film adaptation. And with seven Academy Award nominations and one win for Best Adapted Screenplay, it’s safe to say the Oscars agrees.

This year, a new big-screen adaptation is in the works. Much of the excitement centres around the casting. Daisy Edgar-Jones stars as Elinor Dashwood, alongside Esmé Creed-Miles as Marianne Dashwood, Caitríona Balfe as Mrs Dashwood, George MacKay as Edward Ferrars and Herbert Nordrum as Colonel Brandon. 

BookTok may have started as a corner of the Internet for passionate readers, but its impact now stretches well beyond the algorithm. Whatever the genre, whether it’s romance, psychological thriller, sci-fi or YA, there’s a screen adaptation on the horizon, proving that Hollywood is paying close attention. 

NOW READ

6 things to know about Yerin Ha, Bridgerton’s shiny new diamond

What Jessie Buckley, breakout star of ‘Hamnet’, reads: from Gothic novels to art volumes

Movie review: why Netflix’s ‘People We Meet On Vacation’ should’ve been a series