In the weekend leading up to Valentine’s Day, the top box-office draw was the romantic movie, The Vow, starring Rachel McAdams as a woman who is left with no memory after a car accident. Her husband, played by Channing Tatum has to work to rebuild their marriage.

The movie is based on a true story. A book by the real-life couple is being re-issued as a tie-in by Christian publisher, B&H Publishing Group. The couple appeared on the Today Show this morning.

The book is rising on Amazon’s sales rankings. Holds are growing at several libraries.

The Vow: The True Events that Inspired the Movie Kim Carpenter, Krickitt Carpenter, Dana Wilkerson Retail Price: $14.99 Paperback: 208 pages Publisher: B&H Books – (2012-02-10) ISBN / EAN: 143367579X / 9781433675799

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It’s been a year since the news that Abraham Verghese’s long running best seller Cutting for Stone had been optioned for a movie.

Yesterday, news arrived that Danish director Susanne Bier (In A Better World, winner of an Oscar last year for Best Foreign Language Film )  has been signed for the adaptation. There’s no start date yet and Bier has another movie in the queue, but Playlist notes that, after releasing six films in the last ten years, Bier “shows no signs of slowing down.”

Librarians embraced the book, beginning with Verghese’s appearance at ALA Midwinter 2009 in Denver, where he spoke at the Breakfast and BookTalk sponsored by the AAP Trade Libraries Committee.

Cutting for Stone Abraham Verghese Retail Price: $15.95 Paperback: 688 pages Publisher: Penguin/Vintage – (2010-01-26) ISBN / EAN: 0375714367 / 9780375714368

On the Today show yesterday, Al Roker declared his love for Josh Bazell’s new book, Wild Thing, (Hachette/Little,Brown/Reagan Arthur; Hachette Audio), the sequel to his debut, the darkly comic Beat the Reaper.

Someone on the show may have handed Roker the book; Josh’s father, Bob Bazell is Today‘s chief medical correspondent.

HBO has optioned Beat the Reaper for a series, with Leonardo DeCaprio as executive producer.
 

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The Bourne series is back, with a new director (Tony Gilroy, who wrote the screenplays for the first three movies) and a new star (Jeremy Renner, The Hurt Locker). The first trailer appeared yesterday and fans of the originals, starring Matt Damon and directed by Paul Greengrass, have their knives drawn.

The original movies were loosely based on the trilogy by Robert Ludlum (in fact, Deadline reports that Gilroy famously didn’t even read the first Ludlum book. He just used the book’s basic concept). After Ludlum’s death, Eric Van Lustbader continued the series, with the blessing of Ludlum’s estate. The first was appropriately named The Bourne Legacy. Lustbader has now written six Bourne novels, with a seventh, The Bourne Imperative, (Hachette/Grand Central), coming in July.

Is this movie based on the book? Following in the footsteps of the previous “adaptations,”  it only takes its title from the novel, as Lustbader says in his blog. Officially described as, “A story centered on a new CIA operative in the universe based on Robert Ludlum’s novels,” the movie introduces a new character. Instead of the amnesiac David Webb, who takes on the identity of a ruthless CIA assassin, “Jason Bourne,” a new character joins the Treadstone program as “Kenneth Kitson.” As the trailer puts it, “there was never just one.” Cleverly, this leaves open the possibility of Damon returning to future movies in the series.

Even though it bears little resemblance to the movie, the book will be released as a movie tie-in by St. Martin’s on June 2. The movie arrives August 3.

On the heels of the arrival of the latest in the Fancy Nancy series yesterday, comes the news that Tina Fey is in talks to join Shawn Levy in producing a live-action movie based on the series, for Fox.

Levy directed Fey in Date Night. He’s also had experience with family fare as director of the two Night at the Museum movies.

Fancy Nancy and the Mermaid Ballet Jane O’Connor Retail Price: $17.99 Hardcover: 32 pages Publisher: HarperCollins – (2012-02-07) ISBN / EAN: 0061703818 / 9780061703812

The first trailer for HBO’s Hemingway and Gellhorn just appeared online (the YouTube version was quickly yanked, we don’t know how long the one we nabbed will be available. If it disappears, try linking to  FilmOFillia).

The film stars Clive Owen as Hemingway, Nicole Kidman as Martha Gellhorn, with David Strathairn as John Dos Passos, Peter Coyote as Maxwell Perkins, and Parker Posey as Mary Welsh Hemingway. It is directed by Phiilp Kaufman, who directed another movie based on a literary love story, Henry and June, as well as The Unbearable Lightness of Being and The Right Stuff.

It is produced by Sopranos star James Gandolfini, who worked for 6 years to get it made.

It is not based on a specific book. There are plenty of bios of Hemingway, of course. A bio of Martha Gellhorn was published in 2003 (a profile on NPR’s Morning Edition gives a sense of Gellhorn’s personality; a writer and war correspondent, she hated being known primarily as “Hemingway’s third wife”). It is still available in paperback as well as in many libraries.

Gellhorn: A Twentieth-Century Life Caroline Moorehead Retail Price: $22.99 Trade Pbk 500 pages Publisher: Macmillan/Holt  – (2010-04-01) ISBN / EAN: 0805076964/9780805076967

The Super Bowl movie trailer that most increased book sales may be The Lorax. Dr. Seuss’s 1971 book  rose to to #108 from #287 after the spot aired.

In addition to the original book, Random House has released a series of tie-ins, including a pop-up and two titles in the  “Step into Reading” series.

It’s difficult to judge the effect the pre-Super Bowl trailer for The Hunger Games. The series has been in the Top Five on Amazon for months.

Several tie-ins release tomorrow (full list, after the jump):

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SAG Best Actress Award winner (and Oscar nominee), Viola Davis has been signed for two book-to-movie projects; Beautiful Creatures (see previous story) and the movie based on Orson Scott Card’s sci fi classic, Ender’s Game.

The movie already has a strong cast, with rising young actors Asa Butterfield (Hugo) and Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit) as well as veteran, Harrison Ford.

According to Variety, Ender’s Game will shoot first. If that’s true, it will start soon; other sources report that Beautiful People is scheduled for shooting in April.

Fox has acquired John Green’s new book and #1 NYT Best Seller, The Fault in Our Stars (Dutton; Brilliance Audio). Variety reports that Twilight producers Wyck Godfrey and Marty Bowen have signed on to do the adaptation.

John just wrapped a 17-city tour for the book. He talks about how it felt, below.

Technically, it’s true, as we reported earlier, that a Hunger Games teaser won’t air during the Super Bowl — however, one will appear during the pregame show.

Trying to stay current with this is dizzying. A teaser for the teaser appeared on Entertainment Tonight, briefly on the Web before it was yanked by the studio. As of now, it’s back up:

Finally, an answer for all the teens who have been anxiously awaiting news about the film version of Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl (Hachette/LBYR, 2009). Movie news sources, including Entertainment Weekly‘s blog, report that it now has financing from Warner Bros. and the first cast member has been named, Oscar nominee, Viola Davis. Filming is scheduled to begin in April in New Orleans. UPDATE: The movie is now scheduled for release on Feb. 1, 2013.

Davis will play Amma, referred to by some sites as a librarian. However, in the book is Amma is a housekeeper. There is a librarian in the book, but she is called “Marian” (of course).

The filmmakers may have been waiting for the full series to be complete before moving ahead. Since it was signed in 2009, the two more titles have been published, Beautiful Darkness (2010) and Beautiful Chaos (2011). Hollywood loves teen franchises. UPDATE: The final book, Beautiful Redemption has been announced for release on Oct. 23.

Yesterday, we wrote that this year’s Super Bowl ads bring new twists; advertisers are using social media both to tease the ads and to make them interactive.

A good example of both trends just appeared on the interwebs; a teaser trailer for the longer Super Bowl teaser trailer (calling M. C. Escher!) of the movie John Carter (based on the first book in the classic series by Edgar Rice Burroughs). The interactive part is signaled by voice-over proclaiming, “For a chance to win tickets to next year’s Super Bowl, look for the exclusive code in the John Carter commercial at this year’s big game!” Viewers can then rush to their computers, pick up their tablets or smart phones to enter the code.

Clearly Disney is pulling out all the stops for John Carter. The first trailer had a “world premiere”  on Good Morning America, in early December.

The movie arrives on March 9, with a wide range of tie-ins. Edgar Rice Burroughs’ classic pulp fiction John Carter series, also referred to as the Barsoom series, predates his Tarzan series, and was the basis of several graphic novels. The series began with A Princess of Mars, which was first published as a book in 1917 and is the basis for the movie.

There are numerous movie tie-ins (including coloring and activity books, indicating it’s expected to attract kids).

Disney Book Group is releasing a novelization, which also includes the original text of A Princess of Mars, for ages 13 and up.

John Carter: The Movie Novelization: Also includes: A Princess of Mars Stuart Moore, Edgar Rice Burroughs Retail Price: $9.99 Paperback: 560 pages Publisher: Disney Editions – (2012-02-07) ISBN / EAN: 1423165586 / 9781423165583

Marvel is releasing a “prequel” (ages “13 to 99” — if you’re 100 or over, you’re out of luck),

John Carter: World Of Mars Peter David Retail Price: $14.99 Paperback: 112 pages Publisher: Marvel – (2012-02-15) ISBN / EAN: 0785160418 / 9780785160410

Plus a new graphic novel version (also ages “13 to 99”),

John Carter: A Princess of Mars (John Carter of Mars) Roger Langridge Retail Price: $14.99 Paperback: 120 pages Publisher: Marvel – (2012-02-15) ISBN / EAN: 0785160426 / 9780785160427

Aimed at collectors, Marvel is also releasing a pricey omnibus of various classic 1970’s graphic novels based on the series, (ages “13 to 99”),

John Carter, Warlord of Mars Omnibus Marv Wolfman, Chris Claremont, Peter Gillis, Bill Mantlo Retail Price: $99.99 Hardcover: 632 pages Publisher: Marvel – (2012-02-22) ISBN / EAN: 0785159908 / 9780785159902

Disney Book Group is releasing collections of the original novels (the series is in the public domain, so there are several other editions as well as audio versions available. Ebook versions are available from OverDrive.)

Collected John Carter of Mars, The (A Princess of Mars, Gods of Mars, and Warlord of Mars) Edgar Rice Burroughs Retail Price: $16.99 Paperback: 768 pages Publisher: Disney Editions – (2012-02-07) ISBN / EAN: 1423154266 / 9781423154266

Other volumes in the series are:

Collected John Carter of Mars, The (Swords of Mars, Synthetic Men of Mars, Llana

Collected John Carter of Mars, The (Thuvia, Maid of Mars; The Chessmen of Mars

Disney is also realeasing an “art of the movie” tie-in,

Terry Brooks announced on his blog yesterday that Warner Brothers has optioned his Magic Kingdom of Landover series. He cautions, however, that he’s been down this route before with no result. As he said in his 2009 holiday letter, Universal had the rights to the series until April of 2010, but it went nowhere. Warner has had an option on his Shannara series for a while. In that case, a director was hired, but then moved on.

He seems more hopeful about Warner’s plans for The Magic Kingdom. He says there has been interest from “a major actor” and a screen writer is working on the adaptation, giving  “reason to believe after talking to the principals that this time we have more than words to suggest something might really happen.”

The first book in the series is Magic Kingdom for Sale – Sold! (RH/Del Rey, 1986).

UPDATE: Lionsgate will air a new Hunger Games teaser — not during the Super Bowl, but during the pregame (it’s so much fun trying to keep up with this).

Here’s the teaser for the teaser:

Did you know that the Super Bowl ads are a predictor of the economy? According to the San Francisco Chronicle, there will be more automobile ads this year and the first real estate ad in two decades, indicating that advertisers, at least, think consumers are ready to spend on big-ticket items. And social media has taken hold. No longer content to just create and run a memorable spot, advertisers are leaking teasers online and embedding URL’s so viewers, with tablets, laptops and iPhones in hand as they watch the game, can join contests and share favorite clips with friends.

But one business seems to be pulling back. Last year, movie studios ran ads for 15 films, including 5 based on books or comic books. The L.A. Times‘ roundup of studio advertising this year mentions only 4 spots, with just one based on a book (Disney may use its spot to promote John Carter, based on Edgar Rice Burroughs’ A Princess of Mars, RH/Modern Library).

Lionsgate is sitting out this Super Bowl, so fans of Hunger Games will not be treated to a new trailer (the latest one, below, was released in mid November). That may be a good thing. Promotion via social media, has been so heavy that some media observers wonder if all that blogging, Tweeting, Facebooking, Googling, and YouTubing is just too much.

The book War Horse by Michael Morpurgo is now a best seller, thanks to the long-running play in London and on Broadway, and Steven Spielberg’s movie. Today’s NYT Arts Beat blog quotes the author saying that before the adaptations, “It simply was not a book that anyone really knew about or cared about,” selling just 25,000 copies in its first 25 years. The play brought sales of 950,000 copies and the movie put it at #1 on the NYT Children’s paperback list, where it has remained for the last seven weeks (it rose as high as #17 on the USA Today general list).

Now Morpurgo and his book are getting even more attention. ALA has announced that the author, who is the Children’s Laureate in the UK, will deliver the 2013 Arbuthnot Lecture. Applications for hosting the lecture will be available this spring on the ALSC Web  site.

War Horse: (Movie Cover) Michael Morpurgo Retail Price: $8.99 Paperback: 192 pages Publisher: Scholastic Press – (2011-11-01) ISBN / EAN: 0545403359 / 9780545403351