It Was a Book First! (#1) - An Introduction

Hi everyone!  I bet you are wondering what "It Was a Book First!" is all about.  Well let me tell you!

Have you ever realized how many books have been turned into movies?  There are quite a bit, and more are released and/or announced every day it seems.  It is ridiculous.  I wish the movie industry could come up with their own ideas.

Now, don't get me wrong.  There are books out there that have/should be turned into movies.  Sometimes you just need your favorite book to hit the big screen.  You have reread that book a bunch of times already and you are ready to experience it in a whole new way.  Also, it may be the only way you can get someone you know to experience the story (even us readers have non-readers in our lives).

All of that being said, lovers of any given book want the movie to do the book justice.  It isn't much to ask for really.  Stick to the story line and don't change it.  It was good the way it was written, don't mess with it.  But we all know that this doesn't happen very often.  The story in the movie is usually changed at least a little from how it was written in the book (but sometimes the changes are very drastic).

So here in "It Was a Book First" you will find me ranting or raving (usually ranting) about how a movie adaptation was done.  These are not meant to be reviews, they are meant to be ways for me to vent my anger (or love?) about the movie.  I am not a huge movie fan in the first place, so be warned!  Also, I will just say it now, if any spoilers slip out for either the book or the movie I am sorry!  I will try hard not to let any slip!

You may be wondering where the title of this movie ranting feature came from, and I will tell you.  As you are hopefully already aware, I spent a good 6 years or so of my life being a bookseller.  When you are a bookseller you hear a lot of things get said.  Some of which aren't very smart.  A very common one around the release of a "popular" movie is something along the lines of "Oh they wrote a book based off of the movie!"  Well, when you are working you can't really go up to the customer and tell them that they are wrong all you can do is scream in your head at them that "IT WAS A BOOK FIRST!!!" and then mentally face palm yourself and roll your eyes.

I don't know how non-book people make it into a bookstore in the first place, but they do.  Then they sadly make it quite obvious that they are not book people while they are there...

Any ways, I hope you enjoy.  And I will welcome any and all comments about any of the movies I end up posting about.  Feel free to make the comments section a place you feel you can rant or rave along with me (or even against!).

I already have a few movies in my head that I plan to rant about.  Can you guess which ones they are?  Here is a hint - one is based off of an extremely popular Middle Grade novel?