2020 Books To Movies & TV Adaptations

Covid changed so much of the movie and tv industry this year, but thanks to streaming services we still got A LOT of 2020 Books To Movies & TV Adaptations! I’ll always be a read the book before watching the movie kind of person and there’s no shortage of great projects that gave me plenty to read in 2020.
From projects like Just Mercy which released just in time to be an important part of the Black Lives Matter movement over the summer, to The Queen’s Gambit which got us all through the Fall slog of quarantine, it was a good year for 2020 Books To Movies & TV Adaptations.

2020 Books To Movies & TV Adaptations

Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson (Trailer)

Release Info: January 10th
Summary: “Just Mercy shadows world-renowned civil rights defense attorney Bryan Stevenson as he recounts his experiences and details the case of a condemned death row prisoner whom he fought to free.”

Starring: Michael B. Jordan, Jamie Foxx, Brie Larson

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
DVD // Digital // Streaming on HBO Max

The Bone Collector (Lincoln Rhyme Book 1) by Jeffery Deaver (Trailer)

Release Info: Premiered on January 10th, NBC

Summary: “Lincoln Rhyme was once a brilliant criminologist, a genius in the field of forensics—until an accident left him physically and emotionally shattered. But now a diabolical killer is challenging Rhyme to a terrifying and ingenious duel of wits. With police detective Amelia Sachs by his side, Rhyme must follow a labyrinth of clues that reaches back to a dark chapter in New York City’s past.”

Starring: Russell Hornsby, Arielle Kebbel

Notes: Cancelled after one season

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Peacock

The Outsider by Stephen King (Trailer)

Release Info: Premiered on January 12th, HBO

Summary: “An eleven-year-old boy’s violated corpse is discovered in a town park. Eyewitnesses and fingerprints point unmistakably to one of Flint City’s most popular citizens—Terry Maitland, Little League coach, English teacher, husband, and father of two girls. As the investigation expands and horrifying details begin to emerge. Terry Maitland seems like a nice guy, but is he wearing another face? When the answer comes, it will shock you as only Stephen King can.”

Starring: Ben Mendelsohn, Jason Bateman, John Gettier, Marc Menchaca

Notes: Cancelled after one season

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on HBO Max

The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle by Hugh Lofting (Trailer)

Release Info: January 17th

Summary: “After losing his wife seven years earlier, the eccentric John Dolittle, famed doctor and veterinarian of Victorian England, hermits himself away behind the high walls of Dolittle Manor with only his menagerie of animals for company. But when Queen Victoria falls gravely ill, a reluctant Dolittle is forced to set sail on an epic adventure to a mythical island in search of a cure, regaining his wit and courage as he crosses old adversaries and encounters wondrous creatures”

Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Antonio Banderas, Michael Sheen, Emma Thompson, Rami Malek

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
DVD // Digital // Streaming on HBO Max

The Turn of the Screw by Henry James (Trailer)

Release Info: January 24th

Summary: “The Turning takes us to a mysterious estate in the Maine countryside, where newly appointed nanny Kate is charged with the care of two disturbed orphans, Flora and Miles. Quickly though, she discovers that both the children and the house are harboring dark secrets and things may not be as they appear”

Starring: Mackenzie Davis, Finn Wolfhard, Brooklynn Prince

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
DVD // Digital

The Stranger by Harlan Coban (Trailer)

Release Info: January 30th, Netflix

Summary: “The Stranger appears out of nowhere, perhaps in a bar, or a parking lot, or at the grocery store. Their identity is unknown. Their motives are unclear. The information is undeniable. Then they whisper a few words in your ear and disappear, leaving you picking up the pieces of your shattered world…”

Starring: Richard Armitage, Hannah John-Kamen, Dervla Kirwan

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Netflix

The Rhythm Section by Mark Burnell (Trailer)

Release Info: January 31st

Summary: “Stephanie Patrick is devastated after her whole family dies in a plane crash. But when she discovers that the downing of flight NE027 wasn’t an accident but an act of terrorism, Stephanie enters the fight of her life to achieve her one goal: revenge. When she’s recruited by a covert intelligence organization, Stephanie sees a means to an end. But as her missions become more brutal, and the stakes grow ever higher, she begins to question everything she knows about flight NEO027.”

Starring: Blake Lively, Jude Law, Sterling K. Brown

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
DVD // Digital // Streaming on Hulu

2020 Books To Movies & TV Adaptations

The Call Of The Wild by Jack London (Trailer)

Release Info: February 21st

Summary: “A gripping tale of a heroic dog that, thrust into the brutal life of the Alaska Gold Rush, ultimately faces a choice between living in man’s world and returning to nature.”

Starring: Harrison Ford

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
DVD // Digital // Streaming on HBO Max

The Last Thing He Wanted by Joan Didion (Trailer)

Release Info: February 21st, Netflix

Summary: “Elena McMahon, estranged from a life of celebrity fundraisers and from her powerful West Coast husband, Wynn Janklow, whom she has left, taking Catherine, her daughter, to become a reporter for The Washington Post. Suddenly walking off the 1984 campaign, she finds herself boarding a plane for Florida to see her father, Dick McMahon. It is from this moment that she is caught up in something much larger than she could have imagined, something that includes Ambassador-at-Large Treat Austin Morrison and Alexander Brokaw, the ambassador to an unnamed Caribbean island.”

Starring: Anne Hathaway, Ben Affleck, Willem Dafoe

bookshop.org // Kindle  // Audiobook
Streaming on Netflix

Emma by Jane Austen (Trailer)

Release Info: February 21st

Summary: “In 1800s England, a well meaning but selfish young woman meddles in the love lives of her friends.”

Starring: Anya Taylor-Joy, Angus Imrie, Letty Thomas

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
DVD // Digital // Streaming on HBO Max

The Invisible Man by H.G. Wells (Trailer)

Release Info: February 28th

Summary: “An optics scientist who discovers a method of rendering the body invisible. Successfully completing the procedure on himself, he quickly finds that he is unable to reverse the effect. Initially, he delights in the advantages of his invisibility, but his subsequent descent into madness and violence have captivated generations of horror readers. When Cecilia’s abusive ex takes his own life and leaves her fortune, she suspects his death was a hoax. As a series of coincidences turn lethal, Cecilia works to prove that she is being hunted by someone nobody can see.”

Starring: Elisabeth Moss, Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Storm Reid

Notes:The movie isn’t an adaptaion, but a modern story based on a similar premise. Which is fine because I don’t really remember the original book lol. The movie looks SO GOOD though!

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
DVD // Digital // Streaming on HBO Max

The Pale Horse by Agatha Christie (Trailer)

Release Info: March 13th, Amazon Prime

Summary: “When an elderly priest is murdered, the killer searches the victim so roughly that his already ragged cassock is torn in the process. What was the killer looking for? And what had a dying woman confided to the priest on her deathbed only hours earlier? Mark Easterbrook and his sidekick Ginger Corrigan are determined to find out. Maybe the three women who run The Pale Horse public house, and who are rumored to practice the “Dark Arts,” can provide some answers?”

Starring: Rufus Sewell, Kaya Scodelario, Sheila Atim

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Amazon Prime

Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli (Trailer)

Release Info: March 13th, Disney+

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 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.”

Starring: Grace VanderWaal, Giancarlo Esposito

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Disney+

Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng (Trailer)

Release Info: March 18th, Hulu

Summary: “Follow the intertwined fates of the picture-perfect Richardson family and an enigmatic mother and daughter who upend their lives. The story explores the weight of secrets, the nature of art and identity, the ferocious pull of motherhood – and the danger in believing that following the rules can avert disaster.”

Starring: Reese Witherspoon, Kerry Washington, Joshua Jackson

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Hulu

The Council Of Dads by Bruce Feiler (Trailer)

Release Info: Premiered on March 24th, NBC

Summary: “When author Bruce Feiler discovered he had cancer he was worried about his daughters growing up without him by their sides to advise them. Just days afterward, the best-selling Brooklyn author came up with the idea of asking six friends to look out for his daughters should he not survive.”

Starring: Clive Standen, Sarah Wayne Callies, Michael O’Neill

Notes: Cancelled after one season

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook

Unorthodox: The Scandalous Rejection of My Hasidic Roots by Deborah Feldman (Trailer)

Release Info: March 26th, Netflix

Summary: “As a member of the strictly religious Satmar sect of Hasidic Judaism, Deborah Feldman grew up under a code of relentlessly enforced customs governing everything from what she could wear and to whom she could speak to what she was allowed to read. It was stolen moments spent with the empowered literary characters of Jane Austen and Louisa May Alcott that helped her to imagine an alternative way of life. Trapped as a teenager in a sexually and emotionally dysfunctional marriage to a man she barely knew, the tension between Deborah’s desires and her responsibilities as a good Satmar girl grew more explosive until she gave birth at nineteen and realized that, for the sake of herself and her son, she had to escape.”

Starring: Shira Haas, Amit Rahav, Jeff Wilbusch

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Netflix

The Willoughbys by Lois Lowry (Trailer)

Release Info: April 22nd, Netflix

Summary: “Abandoned by their ill-humored parents to the care of an odious nanny, Tim, the twins, Barnaby A and Barnaby B, and their sister, Jane, attempt to fulfill their roles as good old-fashioned children. However, it is an unquestionably ruthless act that sets in motion the transformations that lead to their salvation and to happy endings for not only the four children, but their nanny, an abandoned baby, a candy magnate, and his long-lost son too. Replete with a tongue-in-cheek glossary and bibliography, this hilarious and decidedly old-fashioned parody pays playful homage to classic works of children’s literature.”

Starring: Martin Short, Maya Rudolph, Terry Crews, Alessia Cara

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Netflix

Defending Jacob by William Landay (Trailer)

Release Info: April 24th, Apple TV

Summary: “Andy Barber has been an assistant district attorney for two decades. Then Andy’s quiet suburb is stunned by a shocking crime: a young boy stabbed to death in a leafy park. And an even greater shock: The accused is Andy’s own son—shy, awkward, mysterious Jacob. Andy believes in Jacob’s innocence. Any parent would. But the pressure mounts. Damning evidence. Doubt. A faltering marriage. The neighbors’ contempt. A murder trial that threatens to obliterate Andy’s family.”

Starring: Chris Evans, Michelle Dockery, Jaeden Martell

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Apple TV

Normal People by Sally Rooney (Trailer)

Release Info: April 29th, Hulu

Summary: “Follows Marianne and Connell, from different backgrounds but the same small town in Ireland, as they weave in and out of each other’s romantic lives. Normal People is the story of mutual fascination, friendship and love. It takes us from that first conversation to the years beyond, in the company of two people who try to stay apart but find that they can’t.”

Starring: Daisy Edgar-Jones, Paul Mescal

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Hulu

2020 Books To Movies & TV Adaptations

How To Build A Girl by Caitlin Moran (Trailer)

Release Info: May 8th

Summary: “The novel charts the journey of teenager Johanna Morrigan, who reinvents herself as Dolly Wilde: fast-talking, lady sex-adventurer, moves to London, and gets a job as music critic in the hope of saving her poverty stricken family in Wolverhampton.”

Starring: Beanie Feldstein, Emma Thompson, Jameela Jamil

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
DVD // Digital

I Know This Much Is True by Wally Lamb (Trailer)

Release Info: May 10th, HBO

Summary: “Middle-aged Dominick Birdsey recounts his troubled relationship with Thomas, his paranoid schizophrenic twin brother, and his efforts to get him released from an asylum.”

Starring: Mark Ruffalo, Melissa Leo, Kathryn Hahn

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on HBO Max

Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer (Trailer)

Release Info: June 12th, Disney+

Summary: “Artemis Fowl II , a young Irish criminal mastermind, kidnaps the fairy LEPrecon officer Captain Holly Short for ransom to fund the search for his missing father in order to restore the family fortune.”

Starring: Ferdia Shaw, Judi Dench, Lara McDonnell, Josh Gad

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Disney+

The Good Shepherd (Greyhound) by C.S. Forester (Trailer)

Release Info: July 10th, Apple TV

Summary: “A convoy of thirty-seven merchant ships is ploughing through icy, submarine-infested North Atlantic seas during the most critical days of World War II. In charge is Commander George Krause, an untested veteran of the U.S. Navy. Hounded by a wolf pack of German U-boats, he faces 48 hours of desperate peril trapped the bridge of the ship. Exhausted beyond measure, he must make countless and terrible decisions as he leads his small fighting force against the relentless U-boats.”

Starring: Tom Hanks, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Elisabeth Shue

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Apple TV

I’m Thinking Of Ending Things by Iain Reid (Trailer)

Release Info: September 4th, Netflix

Summary: “An unexpected detour causes a woman who is trying to figure out how to break up with her boyfriend to rethink her life.”

Starring: Jesse Plemons, Jessie Buckley

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Netflix

The Devil All The Time by Donald Ray Pollack (Trailer)

Release Info: September 11th, Netflix

Summary: “Set in rural southern Ohio and West Virginia, The Devil All the Time follows a cast of compelling and bizarre characters from the end of World War II to the 1960s. There’s Willard Russell, tormented veteran of the carnage in the South Pacific, who can’t save his beautiful wife, Charlotte, from an agonizing death by cancer no matter how much sacrifi­cial blood he pours on his “prayer log.” There’s Carl and Sandy Henderson, a husband-and-wife team of serial kill­ers, who troll America’s highways searching for suitable models to photograph and exterminate. There’s the spider-handling preacher Roy and his crippled virtuoso-guitar-playing sidekick, Theodore, running from the law. And caught in the middle of all this is Arvin Eugene Russell, Willard and Charlotte’s orphaned son, who grows up to be a good but also violent man in his own right.”

Starring: Robert Pattinson, Bill Skarsgård, Tom Holland, Sebastian Stan

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Netflix

Enola Holmes by Nancy Springer (Trailer)

Release Info: September 23rd, Netflix

Summary: “When Enola Holmes-Sherlock’s teen sister-discovers her mother missing, she sets off to find her, becoming a super-sleuth in her own right as she outwits her famous brother and unravels a dangerous conspiracy around a mysterious young Lord.”

Starring: Millie Bobby Brown, Henry Cavill, Sam Claflin, Helena Bonham Carter

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Netflix

The Witches by Roald Dahl (Trailer)

Release Info: October 22nd, HBO Max

Summary: “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!”

Starring: Octavia Spencer, Anne Hathaway, Stanley Tucci

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on HBO Max

The Queen’s Gambit by Walter Tevis (Trailer)

Release Info: October 23rd, Netflix

Summary: “Orphaned at the tender age of nine, prodigious introvert Beth Harmon discovers and masters the game of chess in 1960s USA. But child stardom comes at a price.”

Starring: Anya Taylor-Joy, Thomas Brodie-Sangster, Jacob Fortune-Lloyd

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Netflix

Hillbilly Elegy by J.D. Vance (Trailer)

Release Info: November 11th, Netflix

Summary: “The Vance family story begins hopefully in postwar America. J. D.’s grandparents were “dirt poor and in love,” and moved north from Kentucky’s Appalachia region to Ohio in the hopes of escaping the dreadful poverty around them. They raised a middle-class family and eventually one of their grandchildren would graduate from Yale Law School, a conventional marker of success in achieving generational upward mobility. As the family saga of Hillbilly Elegy plays out though, we learn that J.D.’s grandparents, aunt, uncle, sister, and, most of all, his mother struggled profoundly with the demands of their new middle-class life, never fully escaping the legacy of abuse, alcoholism, poverty, and trauma so characteristic of their part of America. With piercing honesty, Vance shows how he himself still carries around the demons of his chaotic family history.”

Starring: Amy Adams, Glenn Close, Gabriel Basso

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Netflix

The Stand by Stephen King (Trailer)

Release Info: December 17th, CBS All Access

Summary: “King’s apocalyptic vision of a world decimated by plague and embroiled in an elemental struggle between good and evil. The fate of mankind rests on the frail shoulders of the 108-year-old Mother Abigail and a handful of survivors. Their worst nightmares are embodied in a man with a lethal smile and unspeakable powers: Randall Flagg, the Dark Man.”

Starring: Alexander Skarsgård James Marsden, Whoopi Goldberg

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on CBS All Access

Good Morning, Midnight(The Midnight Sky) by Lily Brooks-Dalton (Trailer)

Release Info: December 23rd, Netflix

Summary: “This post-apocalyptic tale follows Augustine, a lonely scientist in the Arctic, as he races to stop Sully and her fellow astronauts from returning home to a mysterious global catastrophe.”

Starring: George Clooney(also directing), Felicity Jones, Kyle Chandler

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Netflix

News Of The World by Paulette Jiles (Trailer)

Release Info: December 25th

Summary: “Set in the late 1860s, after the Civil War, while Texas was under martial law, this story centers on the return of a young girl to her family after her kidnapping by the Kiowa.”

Starring: Tom Hanks, Neil Sandilands, Thomas Francis Murphy

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
DVD // Digital

Bridgerton by Julia Quinn (Trailer)

Release Info: December 25th, Netflix

Summary: “Wealth, lust, and betrayal set in the backdrop of Regency era England, seen through the eyes of the powerful Bridgerton family.”

Starring: Julie Andrews, Phoebe Dynevor, Regé-Jean Page

bookshop.org // Kindle // Audiobook
Streaming on Netflix

Happy Reading & Happy Screening!
~Alison

2020 books to movies & tv adaptations