Book to Film

Read the book before you watch the movie!

Updated June 30, 2025
South Pasadena Public Library
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Call me by your name
Aciman, Andre.
Paper Book
Call Me by Your Nameis the story of a sudden and powerful romance that blossoms between an adolescent boy and a summer guest at his parents' cliff-side mansion on the Italian Riviera. Unprepared for the consequences of their attraction, at first each feigns indifference. But during...

Call Me by Your Name (2017) dir. Luca Guadagnino

The Da Vinci code
Brown, Dan
CD

The Da Vinci Code (2006) dir. Ron Howard

The name of the rose
Eco, Umberto
Paper Book
An international sensation and winner of the Premio Strega and the Prix Médicis Etranger awards, this enthralling medieval murder mystery "explodes with pyrotechnic inventions, literally as well as figuratively" (The New York Times) The year is 1327. Benedictines in a wealthy...

The Name of the Rose (1986) dir. Jean-Jacques Annaud

Erasure : a novel
Everett, Percival
Paper Book
Percival Everett's blistering satire about race and publishing, now adapted for the screen as AMERICAN FICTION, directed by Cord Jefferson and starring Jeffrey Wright and Tracee Ellis Ross Thelonious "Monk" Ellison's writing career has bottomed out: his latest manuscript has...

American Fiction (2023) dir. Cord Jefferson

Team of rivals : the political genius of Abraham Lincoln
Goodwin, Doris Kearns.
Paper Book
Winner of the Lincoln Prize Acclaimed historian Doris Kearns Goodwin illuminates Abraham Lincoln's political genius in this highly original work, as the one-term congressman and prairie lawyer rises from obscurity to prevail over three gifted rivals of national reputation to become...

Lincoln (2012) dir. Steven Spielberg

Conclave
Harris, Robert
Paper Book
The best-selling author of Enigma and Fatherland turns to today's Vatican in a ripped-from-the-headlines novel, and gives us his most ambitious, page-turning thriller yet--where the power of God is nearly equaled by the ambition of men. The pope is dead. Behind the...

Conclave (2024) dir. Edward Berger

The price of salt
Highsmith, Patricia
Paper Book
A chance encounter between two lonely women leads to a passionate romance in this lesbian cult classic. Therese, a struggling young sales clerk, and Carol, a homemaker in the midst of a bitter divorce, abandon their oppressive daily routines for the freedom of the open road, where their love can...

Carol (2015) dir. Todd Haynes

Never let me go
Ishiguro, Kazuo
Paper Book
From the Nobel laureate and author of Klara and the Sun, a beautiful hardcover edition of one of his most acclaimed novels: a deeply moving and stunningly original love story with a startling twist One of The New York Times's 10 Best Books of the 21st Century ...

Never Let Me Go (2010) dir. Mark Romanek

One flew over the cuckoo's nest
Kesey, Ken
Paper Book
An international bestseller and the basis for the hugely successful film, Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is one of the defining works of the 1960s. In this classic novel, Ken Kesey's hero is Randle Patrick McMurphy, a boisterous, brawling, fun-loving rebel who...

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975) dir. Miloš Forman

Crazy rich Asians : a novel
Kwan, Kevin
Paper Book
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * The international sensation and blockbuster Hollywood rom com. * "A Pride and Prejudice-like send-up about an heir bringing his Chinese-American girlfriend home to meet his ancestor-obsessed family." --People   ...

Crazy Rich Asians (2018) dir. Jon M. Chu

Shutter Island
Lehane, Dennis.
Paper Book
The basis for the blockbuster motion picture directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Shutter Island by New York Times bestselling author Dennis Lehane is a gripping and atmospheric psychological thriller where nothing is quite what it seems. The New York Times calls Shutter...

Shutter Island (2010) dir. Martin Scorsese

Life of Pi : a novel
Martel, Yann
CD
Martel's novel tells the story of Pi-short for Piscine-an unusual boy raised in a zoo in India. Pi's father decides to move the family to live in Canada and sell the animals to the great zoos of America. The ship taking them across the Pacific sinks and Pi finds himself the sole human survivor on a...

Life of Pi (2012) dir. Ang Lee

Twelve years a slave
Northup, Solomon
Paper Book
The official movie tie-in edition to the winner of the 2014 Academy Award for Best Picture, starring Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender, and Lupita Nyong'o, and directed by Steve McQueen   New York Times bestseller "I could not believe that I...

Twelve Years a Slave (2013) dir. Steve McQueen

The orchid thief
Orlean, Susan.
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK nbsp; A modern classic of personal journalism, The Orchid Thief is Susan Orlean's wickedly funny, elegant, and captivating tale of an amazing obsession. Determined to clone an endangered flower--the...

Adaptation (2002) dir. Spike Jonze

THE NOTEBOOK
Sparks, Nicholas.
Paper Book
The unforgettable, heartbreaking love story from a New York Times bestselling author about a young socialite and the boy who once stole her heart--now an iconic motion picture starring Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams. At thirty-one, Noah Calhoun, back in coastal...

The Notebook (2004) dir. Nick Cassavetes

The help
Stockett, Kathryn.
Paper Book
The #1 New York Times bestselling novel and basis for the Academy Award-winning film--a timeless and universal story about the lines we abide by, and the ones we don't--nominated as one of America's best-loved novels by PBS's The Great American Read. Aibileen is a...

The Help (2011) dir. Tate Taylor

The Joy Luck Club
Tan, Amy.
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * Amy Tan's modern classic that examines the sometimes painful, often tender, and always deep connection between mothers and daughters "For me, [The Joy Luck Club] was one of those once-in-a-lifetime reading experiences that you cherish...

The Joy Luck Club (1993) dir. Wayne Wang


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