Best Books Being Made Into Movies 2020

There are so many fantastic books being made into movies this year! If you are a big fan of going to movies, this would be a fantastic Reading Challenge for you this year! Grab a copy of my BOOKS BEING MADE INTO MOVIES – 2020 and get busy reading!

Even if you don’t want to spend your year reading books being made into movies, this is a fantastic list to see what’s coming out this year. Which movie are you most looking forward to seeing this year? Leave me a comment and let me know!

January

1. Just Mercy (January 17)

Book Title: Just Mercy

Author: Bryan Stevenson

Purchase book from Amazon: Just Mercy

Summary

Bryan Stevenson was a young lawyer when he founded the Equal Justice Initiative, a legal practice dedicated to defending those most desperate and in need: the poor, the wrongly condemned, and women and children trapped in the farthest reaches of our criminal justice system. One of his first cases was that of Walter McMillian, a young man who was sentenced to die for a notorious murder he insisted he didn’t commit. The case drew Bryan into a tangle of conspiracy, political machination, and legal brinksmanship—and transformed his understanding of mercy and justice forever.

Movie Trailer

2. Doolittle (January 17)

Book Title: The Voyages of Doctor Doolittle

Author: Hugh Lofting

Purchase book from Amazon: The Voyages of Doctor Doolittle

Summary

RDJ is not just Ironman! I used to love this book when I was young (yep, it’s an old book, lol). And I am really excited that this book is being made into a movie this year!

This Newbery Medal-winning adventure, the second book in the ever-popular Doctor Dolittle series, finds the physician who can talk to animals setting sail in search of a missing colleague. Join the good doctor and his new assistant, nine-year-old Tommy Stubbins, as they hunt for Long Arrow, the world’s greatest naturalist. Together with Jip the Dog, Polynesia the Parrot, and other memorable characters, the doctor and Tommy travel from their home in Puddleby-on-the-Marsh to the Mediterranean sea and South America, braving a shipwreck on a mysterious island and encountering an enigmatic creature at the bottom of the ocean.

Movie Trailer

3. The Turning (January 24)

Book Title: The Turn of the Screw

Author: Henry James

Purchase book from Amazon: The Turn of the Screw

Summary

The story begins when a governess arrives at an English country estate to look after Miles, aged ten, and Flora, eight. At first, everything appears normal but then events gradually begin to weave a spell of psychological terror.

One night a ghost appears before the governess. It is the dead lover of Miss Jessel, the former governess. Later, the ghost of Miss Jessel herself appears before the governess and the little girl. Moreover, both the governess and the housekeeper suspect that the two spirits have appeared to the boy in private. The children, however, adamantly refuse to acknowledge the presence of the two spirits, in spite of indications that there is some sort of evil communication going on between the children and the ghosts.

Without resorting to clattering chains, demonic noises, and other melodramatic techniques, this elegantly told tale succeeds in creating an atmosphere of tingling suspense and unspoken horror matched by few other books in the genre. Known for his probing psychological novels dealing with the upper classes, James in this story tried his hand at the occult — and created a masterpiece of the supernatural that has frightened and delighted readers for nearly a century.

Movie Trailer

February

4. To All The Boys: P.S. I Still Love You (February 12)

Book Title:  P.S. I Still Love You

Author: Jenny Han

Purchase book from Amazon: P.S. I Still Love You

Summary

Lara Jean didn’t expect to really fall for Peter.

She and Peter were just pretending. Except suddenly they weren’t. Now Lara Jean is more confused than ever.

When another boy from her past returns to her life, Lara Jean’s feelings for him return too. Can a girl be in love with two boys at once?

In this charming and heartfelt sequel to the New York Times bestseller To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, we see first love through the eyes of the unforgettable Lara Jean. Love is never easy, but maybe that’s part of what makes it so amazing.

Movie Trailer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCUAcvvBoOQ

5. The Call of the Wild (February 21)

Book Title: The Call of the Wild

Author: Jack London

Purchase the book from Amazon: The Call of the Wild

Summary

The story is set in the Yukon during the 1890s Klondike Gold Rush—a period in which strong sled dogs were in high demand. The novel’s central character is a dog named Buck, a domesticated dog living at a ranch in the Santa Clara Valley of California as the story opens. Stolen from his home and sold into service as a sled dog in Alaska, he reverts to a wild state.

Buck is forced to fight in order to dominate other dogs in a harsh climate. Eventually, he sheds the veneer of civilization, relying on primordial instincts and learned experience to emerge as a leader in the wild. London lived for most of a year in the Yukon collecting material for the book.

The story was serialized in the Saturday Evening Post in the summer of 1903; a month later it was released in book form. The novel’s great popularity and success made a reputation for London. Much of its appeal derives from the simplicity of this tale of survival. 

Movie Trailer

6. The Invisible Man (February 28)

Book Title: The Invisible Man

Author: H.G. Wells

Purchase book from Amazon: The Invisible Man

Summary

I am excited about this book being made into a movie! With the technology available to moviemakers today, I am hopeful that they do a fabulous job with it!

The Invisible Man is a science fiction novella by H. G. Wells published in 1897. Originally serialized in Pearson’s Weekly in 1897, it was published as a novel the same year.

The Invisible Man of the title is Griffin, a scientist who has devoted himself to research into optics and invents a way to change a body’s refractive index to that of air so that it absorbs and reflects no light and thus becomes invisible. He successfully carries out this procedure on himself but fails in his attempt to reverse the procedure.

Movie Trailer

 

March

 

April

7. Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway (April 3)

Book Title: The Tale of Peter Rabbit

Author: Beatrix Potter

Purchase book from Amazon: The Tale of Peter Rabbit

Summary

This is the continuing adventures of Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit.

Movie Trailer

8. Fatherhood (April 3)

Book Title:  Two Kisses For Maddy

Author: Matthew Logelin

Purchase book from Amazon: Two Kisses for Maddy

Summary

Matt and Liz Logelin were high school sweethearts. After years of long-distance dating, the pair finally settled together in Los Angeles, and they had it all: a perfect marriage, a gorgeous new home, and a baby girl on the way. Liz’s pregnancy was rocky, but they welcomed Madeline, beautiful and healthy, into the world. Just twenty-seven hours later, Liz suffered a pulmonary embolism and died instantly, without ever holding the daughter whose arrival she had so eagerly awaited.

Though confronted with devastating grief and the responsibilities of a new and single father, Matt did not surrender to devastation; he chose to keep moving forward, to make a life for Maddy.

In this memoir, Matt shares bittersweet and often humorous anecdotes of his courtship and marriage to Liz; of relying on his newborn daughter for the support that she unknowingly provided; and of the extraordinary online community of strangers who have become his friends. In honoring Liz’s legacy, heartache has become solace.

Movie Trailer

 

9. The Secret Garden (April 17)

Book Title: The Secret Garden

Author: Frances Hodgson Burnett

Purchase book from Amazon: The Secret Garden

Summary

After a tragedy leaves Mary Lennox orphaned, the bratty ten-year-old British girl is sent from her home in India to Yorkshire, to live with Archibald Craven, a distant uncle whom she has never met.

At first, life in the isolated Misselthwaite Manor is as cold and desolate as the bleak moor outside her window. Then Mary learns the story of the late Mrs. Craven, the estate’s mistress, who spent hours in a walled garden tending to her roses. Mrs. Craven died after an accident in the garden, and her forlorn husband forbids anyone to enter it again, locking it and burying the key. The tale piques Mary’s curiosity and inspires her to find this secret garden, a search that introduces her to new friends, including a robin redbreast; Dickson, a twelve-year-old boy with a kindness to animals; and Colin, her secluded sickly first-cousin. Spending time in the garden transforms Mary and Colin and ultimately, life at Misselthwaite Manor itself.

Movie Trailer

May

10. Greyhound (May 8)

Book Title: The Good Shepherd

Author: C.S. Forester

Purchase book from Amazon: The Good Shepherd

Summary

The mission of Commander George Krause of the United States Navy is to protect a convoy of thirty-seven merchant ships making their way across the icy North Atlantic from America to England. There, they will deliver desperately needed supplies, but only if they can make it through the wolfpack of German submarines that awaits and outnumbers them in the perilous seas. For forty eight hours, Krause will play a desperate cat and mouse game against the submarines, combating exhaustion, hunger, and thirst to protect fifty million dollars’ worth of cargo and the lives of three thousand men.

Movie Trailer

11. The Woman in the Window (May 15)

Book Title: The Woman in the Window

Author: A.J. Finn

Purchase book from Amazon: The Woman in the Window

Summary

If you are into thrillers, you’ll want to check out this book! And, since this book is being made into a movie this year, you can enjoy being scared again when the movie comes out!

Anna Fox lives alone—a recluse in her New York City home, unable to venture outside. She spends her day drinking wine (maybe too much), watching old movies, recalling happier times . . . and spying on her neighbors.

Then the Russells move into the house across the way: a father, mother, their teenaged son. The perfect family. But when Anna, gazing out her window one night, sees something she shouldn’t, her world begins to crumble and its shocking secrets are laid bare.

What is real? What is imagined? Who is in danger? Who is in control? In this diabolically gripping thriller, no one—and nothing—is what it seems.

Movie Trailer

 

12. Artemis Fowl (May 29)

Book Title: Artemis Fowl

Author: Eoin Colfer

Purchase book from Amazon: Artemis Fowl

Summary

Twelve-year-old Artemis is a millionaire, a genius-and above all, a criminal mastermind. But Artemis doesn’t know what he’s taken on when he kidnaps a fairy, Captain Holly Short of the LEPrecon Unit. These aren’t the fairies of the bedtime stories-they’re dangerous!

Movie Trailer

 

June

 

July

 

August

13. Dragon Rider (August 6)

Book Title: Dragon Rider

Author: Cornelia Funke

Purchase book from Amazon: Dragon Rider

Summary

With a lonely boy named Ben on board, the brave young dragon Firedrake sets out on a magical journey to find the mythical place where silver dragons can live in peace forever. Flying over moonlit lands and sparkling seas, they encounter fantastic creatures, summon up surprising courage — and cross the path of a ruthless villain with an ancient grudge who’s determined to end their quest. Only a secret destiny can save the dragons in this enchanting adventure about the true meaning of home.

Movie Trailer

14. The One and Only Ivan (August 14)

Book Title: The One and Only Ivan

Author: Katherine Applegate

Purchase book from Amazon: The One and Only Ivan

Summary

This is a favorite book of mine, so I’m excited that this book is being made into a movie this year! I’m hoping they do a beautiful job with it!

Having spent twenty-seven years behind the glass walls of his enclosure in a shopping mall, Ivan has grown accustomed to humans watching him. He hardly ever thinks about his life in the jungle. Instead, Ivan occupies himself with television, his friends Stella and Bob, and painting. But when he meets Ruby, a baby elephant taken from the wild, he is forced to see their home, and his art, through new eyes.

Movie Trailer

 

September

15. Without Remorse (September 18)

Book Title: Without Remorse

Author: Tom Clancy

Purchase book from Amazon: Without Remorse

Summary

John Clark, a Navy SEAL, goes on a path to avenge his wife’s murder only to find himself inside of a larger conspiracy.

Movie Trailer

October

16. Death on the Nile (October 9)

Book Title: Death on the Nile

Author: Agatha Christie

Purchase book from Amazon: Death on the Nile

Summary

 Beloved detective Hercule Poirot embarks on a journey to Egypt in one of Agatha Christie’s most famous mysteries, Death on the Nile. The tranquility of a cruise along the Nile was shattered by the discovery that Linnet Ridgeway had been shot through the head. She was young, stylish, and beautiful. A girl who had everything . . . until she lost her life.

Hercule Poirot recalled an earlier outburst by a fellow passenger: I’d like to put my dear little pistol against her head and just press the trigger. Yet in this exotic setting, nothing is ever quite what it seems.

Movie Trailer

17. The Witches (October 9)

Book Title:  The Witches

Author: Roald Dahl

Purchase book from Amazon: The Witches

Summary

Roald Dahl was a favorite author of both of my kids when they were younger. Make sure you have your kids read this book (again?) before the movie comes out!

This is not a fairy tale. This is about real witches.

Grandmamma loves to tell about witches. Real witches are the most dangerous of all living creatures on earth. There’s nothing they hate so much as children, and they work all kinds of terrifying spells to get rid of them. Her grandson listens closely to Grandmamma’s stories—but nothing can prepare him for the day he comes face-to-face with The Grand High Witch herself!

Movie Trailer

November

December

18. Dune (December 18)

Book Title: Dune

Author: Frank Herbert

Purchase book from Amazon: Dune

Summary

Set on the desert planet Arrakis, it is the story of the boy Paul Atreides, who will become the mysterious man known as Muad’Dib. Paul’s noble family is named stewards of Arrakis, whose sands are the only source of a powerful drug called “the spice.”

After his family is brought down in a traitorous plot, Paul must go undercover to seek revenge, and to bring to fruition humankind’s most ancient and unattainable dream. A stunning blend of adventure and mysticism, environmentalism and politics.

Movie Trailer

 

19. News of the World (December 25)

Book Title: News of the World

Author: Paulette Jiles

Purchase book from Amazon: News of the World

Summary

This is another highly anticipated book being made into a movie this year! And, the movie is starring Tom Hanks, so you know it’s going to be wonderful! Check out the book early, then plan on a wonderful Christmas day outing!

In the wake of the Civil War, Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd travels through northern Texas, giving live readings from newspapers to paying audiences hungry for news of the world. An elderly widower who has lived through three wars and fought in two of them, the captain enjoys his rootless, solitary existence.

In Wichita Falls, he is offered a $50 gold piece to deliver a young orphan to her relatives in San Antonio. Four years earlier, a band of Kiowa raiders killed Johanna’s parents and sister; sparing the little girl, they raised her as one of their own. Recently rescued by the U.S. Army, the ten-year-old has once again been torn away from the only home she knows.

Their 400-mile journey south through unsettled territory and unforgiving terrain prove difficult and at times dangerous. Johanna has forgotten the English language, tries to escape at every opportunity, throws away her shoes, and refuses to act “civilized.” Yet as the miles pass, the two lonely survivors tentatively begin to trust each other, forming a bond that marks the difference between life and death in this treacherous land.

Arriving in San Antonio, the reunion is neither happy nor welcome. The captain must hand Johanna over to an aunt and uncle she does not remember—strangers who regard her as an unwanted burden. A respectable man, Captain Kidd is faced with a terrible choice: abandon the girl to her fate or become—in the eyes of the law—a kidnapper himself.

Movie Trailer

 

Undated

20. China Rich Girlfriend by Kevin Kwan

Book Title: China Rich Girlfriend

Author: Kevin Kwan

Purchase book from Amazon: China Rich Girlfriend

Summary

Book Two of the Crazy Rich Asians Trilogy (find book one here)

I’m sure this book being made into a movie is highly anticipated by many! The first book & movie were very popular, so there’s no reason to think this one won’t be. Make sure you grab the book first then watch the movie! I’ll update the release date as soon as I hear about it.

It’s the eve of Rachel Chu’s wedding, and she should be over the moon. She has a flawless Asscher-cut diamond, a wedding dress she loves, and a fiancé willing to thwart his meddling relatives and give up one of the biggest fortunes in Asia in order to marry her. Still, Rachel mourns the fact that her birthfather, a man she never knew, won’t be there to walk her down the aisle. 

Then a chance accident reveals his identity. Suddenly, Rachel is drawn into a dizzying world of Shanghai splendor, a world where people attend church in a penthouse, where exotic cars race down the boulevard, and where people aren’t just crazy rich … they’re China rich.

Movie Trailer

 

21. Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier

Book Title: Rebecca

Author:Daphne du Maurier

Purchase book from Amazon: Rebecca

Summary

This classic by Daphne du Maurier should be one of the more popular books made into movies this year! After so many years, it’s still a popular book.

“Last night I dreamt I went to Manderly again.”

With these words, the reader is ushered into an isolated gray stone mansion on the windswept Cornish coast, as the second Mrs. Maxim de Winter recalls the chilling events that transpired as she began her new life as the young bride of a husband she barely knew. For in every corner of every room were phantoms of a time dead but not forgotten—a past devotedly preserved by the sinister housekeeper, Mrs. Danvers: a suite immaculate and untouched, clothing laid out and ready to be worn, but not by any of the great house’s current occupants. With an eerie presentiment of evil tightening her heart, the second Mrs. de Winter walked in the shadow of her mysterious predecessor, determined to uncover the darkest secrets and shattering truths about Maxim’s first wife—the late and hauntingly beautiful Rebecca.

Movie Trailer

 

22. Fear Street 

Book Title: Fear Street series

Author: R.L. Stine

Summary

RL Stine books are always popular with the kids, so it’ll be interesting to see who this movie is being targeted at. But, I’m guessing it will be one of the popular books being made into movies this year!

A murder mystery shakes up the town of Shadyside, Ohio. Feature adaptation of R.L. Stine’s book series.

Movie Trailer

23. Chaos Walking 

Book Title: The Knife of Never Letting Go

Author: Patrick Ness

Purchase book from Amazon: The Knife of Never Letting Go

Summary

Todd Hewitt is the only boy in a town of men. Ever since the settlers were infected with the Noise germ, Todd can hear everything the men think, and they hear everything he thinks. Todd is just a month away from becoming a man, but in the midst of the cacophony, he knows that the town is hiding something from him — something so awful Todd is forced to flee with only his dog, whose simple, loyal voice he hears too. With hostile men from the town in pursuit, the two stumble upon a strange and eerily silent creature: a girl. Who is she? Why wasn’t she killed by the germ like all the females on New World? Propelled by Todd’s gritty narration, readers are in for a white-knuckle journey in which a boy on the cusp of manhood must unlearn everything he knows in order to figure out who he truly is.

Movie Trailer

 

24. Star Girl 

Book Title: Star Girl

Author: Jerry Spinelli

Purchase book from Amazon: Star Girl

Summary

Stargirl. From the day she arrives at quiet Mica High in a burst of color and sound, the hallways hum with the murmur of “Stargirl, Stargirl.” She captures Leo Borlock’s s heart with just one smile. She sparks a school-spirit revolution with just one cheer. The students of Mica High are enchanted. At first.

Then they turn on her. Stargirl is suddenly shunned for everything that makes her different, and Leo, panicked and desperate with love, urges her to become the very thing that can destroy her: normal. In this celebration of nonconformity, Newbery Medalist Jerry Spinelli weaves a tense, emotional tale about the perils of popularity and the thrill and inspiration of first love.

Movie Trailer

 

25. Enola Holmes 

Book Title: The Case of the Missing Marquess

Author: Nancy Springer

Purchase book from Amazon: The Case of the Missing Marquess

Summary

Truth be told, I hadn’t heard of this series until now! It is great for 3-7 graders, and I love that it’s Sherlock Holmes’ sister starring in this book series. This might be a fun series to get your kids interested in. Then they can get excited that this is one of the books being made into a movie this year!!

When Enola Holmes, sister to the detective Sherlock Holmes, discovers her mother has disappeared, she quickly embarks on a journey to London in search of her. But nothing can prepare her for what awaits. Because when she arrives, she finds herself involved in the kidnapping of a young marquess, fleeing murderous villains, and trying to elude her shrewd older brothers—all while attempting to piece together clues to her mother’s strange disappearance. Amid all the mayhem, will Enola be able to decode the necessary clues and find her mother?

Movie Trailer

 

26. The Devil All the Time 

Book Title: The Devil All the Time

Author: Donald Ray Pollock

Purchase book from Amazon: The Devil All the Time

Summary

In the backwoods of Ohio, Willard Russell’s wife is succumbing to cancer, no matter how much he drinks, prays, or sacrifices animals at his “prayer log.” Meanwhile, his son Arvin is growing up, from a kid bullied at school into a man who knows when to take action. Around them swirl a nefarious cast of characters—a demented team of serial killers, a spider-eating preacher, and a corrupt local sheriff—all braided into a riveting narrative of the grittiest American grain.

Movie Trailer

 

27. Minamata 

Book Title: Minamata: The Story of the Poisoning of a City, and of the People Who Chose to Carry the Burden of Courage

Author: W. Eugene Smith

Purchase book from Amazon: Minamata: The Story of the Poisoning of a City

Summary

One of the high points of 20th-century photojournalism: the Smith’s documented the effects of mercury–discharged by a Chisso factory into the town’s water and food supply–on the population and the Japanese government and Chisso’s attempt to hide those effects. Photographs by W. Eugene Smith; text by Aileen M. Smith. 192 pages; over 100 b&w photos; 9.5 x 11.75 inches.

Movie Trailer

 

Books Being Made Into Movies This Year

As you can see, there is a huge offering of books being made into movies this year! Whether you’re into romance, mystery, horror, historical fiction, or even children’s books, there is most definitely something for everyone!

Grab a FREE printable of this list of books and work your way through them this year. I always love reading the book before I see the movie. This would be a fun list for a book club to use, or even a family wanting to read some great books together!

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