Legend starring Tom Hardy (Inception, The Dark Knight Rises) is set to hit theaters in early October, based on The Profession of Violence by John Pearson, a 1972 nonfiction account of the Kray twins who ran the organized crime scene of London’s East End during the 50s and 60s.

The two also owned a nightclub in the swanky West End and hobnobbed with celebrities and politicians, by all accounts living a glittering existence, enjoying the money they raked in through extortion, robbery, arson, assault, and murder. They were arrested and jailed in 1969 and sentenced to life in prison.

Brian Helgeland, a director (42, A Knight’s Tale) and screenwriter (Mystic River, L.A. Confidential) directs. Hardy plays both twins. The cast also includes Emily Browning and Paul Bettany. A movie-tie in edition is due on Sept. 8.

For our full list of upcoming adaptations, download our Books to Movies and TV spreadsheet and link to our listing of tie-ins.

The convoluted path The Lost City of Z (RH/Doubleday;2009; OverDrive Sample) has taken to the big screen is finally set to deliver.

As we reported in 2013, the on-again/off-again movie adaptation has been bumpy, with everyone from Brad Pitt to Benedict Cumberbatch cited as possible stars but the project ended up shelved multiple times.

Now Deadline reports that the next actor to play Spider-Man, Tom Holland, will join the cast that already includes Robert Pattinson, Sienna Miller, and Charlie Hunnam. Flming has begun in Belfast and will continue in Colombia in the fall.

The book grew out of a New Yorker article by David Grann, (Doubleday, Feb, 2009), about British explorer, Percy Fawcett, who disappeared int the Amazon in 1935, during an attempt to prove his claim that a highly sophisticated city, which he called the City of Z, was hidden in the jungle. At the time it was published, the NYT critic Michiko Kakutani gave it a rare rave, “at once a biography, a detective story and a wonderfully vivid piece of travel writing that combines Bruce Chatwinesque powers of observation with a Waugh-like sense of the absurd,” adding, “it reads with all the pace and excitement of a movie thriller and all the verisimilitude and detail of firsthand reportage.” It ended up topping most of the year’s best books lists.

As originally planned, James Gray (We Own the Night) is directing and Brad Pitt’s production company Plan B is overseeing the project.

The setting of The Girl on the Train will be switched for the movie adaptation from the novel’s England to upstate New York, but the lead is still British.

Emily Blunt has recently completed negotiations for the starring role of Rachel. Deadline reports that Swedish actress Rebecca Ferguson is currently in negotiations to play Rachel’s former husband’s wife, Anna.

Ferguson recently made her name by co-starring in an action movie with Tom Cruise, Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation. Blunt has had a similar experience, co-starring with Cruise in last year’s Edge of Tomorrow. Both actresses will draw on a different set of skills for this tale of psychological suspense.

There’s still several roles to be cast, including that of Rachel’s ex-husband Tom. Entertainment Weekly makes their suggestions (Tom Cruise is not one of them).

Tate Taylor (The Help) is directing the movie based on the novel by Paula Hawkins that is still at the top of best seller lists after 31 weeks.

UPDATE, 6/24/15: The third female lead has been cast. American actress Haley Bennett is set to play Megan, the woman Rachel watches from the train each morning until she suddenly disappears, drawing Rachel in to the search for her.

Jennifer Steil’s debut novel, The Ambassador’s Wife, (RH/Doubleday; BOT; OverDrive Sample), may be heading to the small screen.

Mark Gordon (Criminal Minds) is developing the project and Anne Hathaway has agreed to both star and produce. Hathaway’s shine should help give the proposed limited series some juice but the project is not yet attached to a network.

The novel relates the story of the kidnapping of the wife of an ambassador posted in the Middle East. PW ‘s review calls it “a well-crafted, fast-paced novel, packed with ample suspense to keep the pages turning.” The Seattle Times adds it is “brilliantly drawn and deeply troubling.” Steil, a journalist, is in fact also the wife of an ambassador.

Gordon told The Wrap “The Ambassador’s Wife is an incredible story that pulls you in immediately and resonates with all of us based on the images and news headlines that are pervasive in our lives today. We are so fortunate to have Anne starring in this timely, gripping, and compassionate drama. She is in a league all her own and we cannot think of anyone who can better portray Steil’s complex heroine.”

Based on Patricia Highsmith’s The Price Of Salt, 1952 (available in trade paperback from Norton, 2004; movie tie-in coming in Oct.) the film Carol was a hit at the Cannes Film Festival and is considered a strong Oscar contender. Scheduled to debut Nov. 20, the trailer has just been released.

From the goofy dad on the Fox comedy series Malcolm in the Middle to the chilling meth kingpin on AMC’s Breaking Bad and LBJ in Broadway’s All the Way (also set for an HBO adaptation), Bryan Cranston has shown a broad range. Next, he plays Dalton Trumbo in a biopic about the screenwriter who fought against the Hollywood blacklist in the 1940’s, to be released Nov.6 . The trailer has just been released.

Based on the book of the same title by Bruce Cook (S&S/Scribner, 1977), the movie also stars Diane Lane as Trumbo’s wife, Cleo, Elle Fanning as their daughter, Nikola, Helen Mirren as Hollywood gossip columnist Hedda Hopper, along with John Goodman and  Louis C.K.

Trumbo wrote the screenplays for many well-known movies, including Spartacus, Roman Holiday, Papilion, and The Way We Were. He also wrote and directed Johnny Got His Gun, based on his own novel.

A tie-in has not been announced.

Author Adriana Trigiani makes her directorial debut with the movie Big Stone Gap, based on her debut novel, which was the first book in her four-part series.

Starring Ashley Judd, Patrick Wilson, Jenna Elfman, Whoopi Goldberg, and Jane Krakowski, it is set to  open in 250 theaters on October 9. The trailer was just released.

Tie-in:

Big Stone Gap (Movie Tie-in Edition) 
Adriana Trigiani
RH/Ballantine: August 18, 2015
Trade Paperback

Also in October, Trigiani is publishing a new novel, based on the story of actress Loretta Young (hear the HarperCollins Buzz on the book here).

All the Stars in the Heavens
Adriana Trigiani
Harper; HarperAudio; HarperLuxe
October 13, 2015
 

First came a video game Easter egg hunt in Ready Player One (RH/Crown, 2011) then an alien invasion in Armada (RH/Crown; RH & BOT Audio; OverDrive Sample) and now comes the news via the Hollywood Reporter that Ernest Cline has just signed a contract for his third book, to be published by PRH’s Crown Publishing. Details are sketchy at best but the book will be another SF title.

Negotiations for the film rights to the untitled project begin this week. The rights to Armada were sold just after the ink was dry on that book contract. In addition. the the film adaptation of Ready Player One has just been set for release on Dec. 15, 2017 with Steven Spielberg directing the Warner Bros project.

All of this has prompted Deadline Hollywood to crown Cline as the next “Hollywood Franchise Author.”

Both of Cline’s novels have hit the NYT Bestseller lists. Ready Player One continues its long run on the trade paperback list and Armada hit the hardcover Fiction list in its first week of publication.

Librarians have been supporters of the books, making Cline’s debut the number one favorite of 2011 in a Twitter poll.

After years in development, the adaptation of Eric Larson’s true crime title, The Devil in the White City (RH/Crown, 2003) is set to be directed by Martin Scorsese, with Leonardo DiCaprio starring as the serial killer H.H. Holmes who preyed on single young women drawn to the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. This will be the actor and director’s sixth project together.

Paramount won the film rights in a major auction after Warner Bros. let the them lapse last month (DiCaprio bought the rights back in 2010, with plans to star in it. Before that, in 2003, Tom Cruise acquired the rights, also planning to star).

Those who have read the book will agree with Deadline‘s assessment it presents a screen writing challenge because it  “interlac[es] the two main characters, the producer/architect of the World’s Fair and the man who works for him and turns out to be a mass murderer.” However, reports Deadline, the new script writer “[Billy] Ray cracked that, and the town flipped for it.” They don’t explain exactly what they flipped for, however.

Scorsese  is currently wrapping production on Silence, based on the 1996 novel by Japanese writer Shûsaku Endô, expected to release some time next year.

As usual, the director has several other balls in the air. In June, another of his favorite actors, Al Pacino said he’s hoping they will work together on The Irishman, based on the book I Heard You Paint Houses by Charles Brand (Steerforth, 2005).  Late last year, Mark Wahlberg was urging him to do a Boardwalk Empire movie. He has also announced plans direct Sinatra about the singer and to produce The Snowman based on the book by Jo Nesbø. It’s not known which project he will turn to first.

DiCaprio will next be seen in The Revenant, directed by Alejandro G. Inarritu and based on the book by Michael Punke, set for release in December.

Many in the Twittersphere were unhappy when news broke that Sony plans a remake of the 1995 Robin Williams movie Jumanji, so soon after the actor’s death.

I can't be the only one who thinks its WAY too freaking soon to be messing with ANY #RobinWilliams film, can I? #Jumanji

— Ninja Panda (@cherrycokeaf) August 6, 2015

Joining the fray, E Online wrote “not only is the Jumanji remake unnecessary and kind of insulting, but it’s in danger of tarnishing the onscreen legacy of one of the great comedians of our time.”

Sony plans to release the film on Christmas Day 2016. Thus far none of the production team or actors have been announced.

Jumanji (HMH, 1981) by Chris Van Allsburg is one of the few Caldecott books to be made into a full-length movie. The 2015 winner, The Adventures of Beekle: The Unimaginary Friend, will join that short list. It was recently announced that Jason Reitman (Juno) will write/direct the adaption for DreamWorks.

Sony has big plans for the upcoming Goosebumps movie, hoping it will spawn a franchise, reports the L.A. Times. However, that may be a problem. The story notes that the books’s heyday was in the early ’90’s so fans are now too old for the movie and their kids may be too young for the its ten-year-old target audience.

As we reported a few weeks ago, Goosebumps which arrives in theaters Oct. 16 starring Jack Black, is not based on any of the specific titles, but uses the entire series as a jumping-off point. Black plays author R.L. Stine, whose library of Goosebumps manuscripts contain actual monsters, unleashed by local inquisitive kids.

Tie-in editions are on their way (see our listing of Upcoming Movie Tie-ins), but keep your eye on the old Goosebumps titles as well, recently reissued as Classic Goosebumps (with the line “Now a Major Motion Picture” on the covers).

It’s difficult to say which titles may get a bump. In an interview with ComingSoon.net, Stine said that the movie features “All the early monsters that are in the books. They all come out, they’re all there.” He names a few specifically,  “The real evil one is Slappy the Dummy (in the three Night of the Living Dummy titles), he’s there, the Abominable Snowman from Pasadena is there, and lawn gnomes, HUNDREDS of lawn gnomes (Revenge of the Lawn Gnomes). They’re great, they’re really good.” He also mentions  the giant praying mantis from  A Shocker on Shock Street.

Get ready for the ice and fear (and the requests for books). The new adventure disaster film Everest is coming in September (on the 18^th in IMAX 3-D and the 25^th everywhere else). Click on the film poster, left,  to see the full version, but only if you have no fear of heights (the same applies to the trailer, below).

Based on the events of 1996 when eight people died in a blizzard on Mount Everest, the movie stars Jason Clarke, Josh Brolin, John Hawkes, Robin Wright, Michael Kelly, Sam Worthington, Keira Knightley, Emily Watson and Jake Gyllenhaal. It is directed by Baltasar Kormákur (2 Guns, Contraband).

According to the British film magazine, Empire, the film is not based on any single title but draws from multiple sources as well as interviews with the survivors.

Still, there are plenty of books on the disaster. Best known is Jon Krakauer’s Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster. Others include Beck Weathers with Stephen G. Michaud’s Left for Dead: My Journey Home from Everest and Anatoli Boukreev’s The Climb: Tragic Ambitions on Everest. In the film Brolin plays Weathers, Kelly plays Krakauer, and Ingvar Eggert Sigurðsson plays Boukreev.

The only tie-in edition is an unofficial one for Left for Dead (Movie Tie-in Edition): My Journey Home from Everest (RH/Bantam; OverDrive Sample), which according to the publisher “will not feature official tie-in art but will reflect the look and feel of the feature film, and will feature a reading line to make the Everest movie connection.”

“The wizarding world is getting a handsome new addition,” reports Time magazine. Colin Ferrell is joining the cast of the Harry Potter spinoff, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.  Planned as the first in a trilogy, the movie is scheduled for release on November 18, 2016.

Directed by David Yates, who was responsible for 4 of the 7 original Potter films, it stars Eddie Redmayne as Newt Scamander, the writer of the fictional Hogwarts textbook (a real edition was published in 2001 and rereleased earlier this year). J.K. Rowling has written the script.

The other movies in the series are planned for release in two-year intervals; Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them 2 (2018) and Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them 3 (2020).

Get ready for a full-on marketing campaign for the movie adaptation of Andy Weir’s debut sci-fi novel, The Martian (RH/Crown). Following the first trailer, released last month, comes a clip that cleverly introduces the characters.

The movie which debuts on Oct. 2, is directed by Ridley Scott and stars Matt Damon, Jessica Chastain, Michael Peña, Aksel Hennie, Sebastian Stan and Kate Mara.

The Martian (Mass Market MTI)
Andy Weir
RH/Broadway; October 13, 2015
Mass Market; $9.99 USD, $12.99 CAD
9781101905005, 110190500X

First came the controversy over the violence in UFC fighter Ronda Rousey’s autobiography My Fight/Your Fight (S&S/Regan Arts;  OverDrive Sample), which is sitting pretty at #16 on Amazon.

Now comes news that Paramount Pictures has bought the rights to the book and will cast Rousey in the starring role – playing herself. According to Variety Mark Bomback, who adapted Insurgent for the screen, will work on the script and serve as executive producer. Mary Parent (one of the people behind Noah and Godzilla) will produce along with Rousey. A start date has yet to be determined.

It will not be Rousey’s first role. She has been in The Expendables 3, Furious 7, and Entourage and is set to appear in Mile 22 alongside Mark Wahlberg.