Based on the novel

I just want to take this opportunity to briefly speak to anyone out there who has ever said, “I really think my book should be made into a film.”

Okay, stop right there. I don’t want to be a Debbie Downer here, but after hearing this phrase for the 1 billionth time, we at P&P thought something should be said on the subject.

First off, if your goal is to one day have a film on the big screen based on a story you wrote, perhaps you should look into screenwriting. Cut out the middle man. I’m just sayin’....

Second, let’s look at the facts: I recently came across a great article on the Boston Globe’s site about just how many movies are actually made from books these days (fiction, specifically).

One publisher and literary agent interviewed notes that, in the 25 years she’s been in the business, most novels she’s worked with have been optioned for a film—but none made.

However, this isn’t the case for all. Some book rights are snapped up and made in no time. In fact, we’ve had some recent success with books making it into production, including Entering Hades, a true crime book about a serial killer.

Of course, here are also examples like recent Oscar buzz-worthy flick Revolutionary Road, a book that was written in 1961 and just made into a movie in 2008 (after much campaigning from star Kate Winslet and her husband, director Sam Mendes).

Another instance is novelist Elinor Lipman, who sold an option to her book Then She Found Me 19 years ago, only to have it made into a movie that went into limited release in April 2008.

And if the recent Watchmen fiasco is any indication, sometimes it may just be better not to have your book optioned at all.

In the end, it’s important to remember why you’re an author in the first place—hopefully because you feel a calling to share your story with readers and you’re passionate about what you do. The goal of your publicity campaign shouldn’t necessarily be to get your book made into a movie, but to establish your presence as an author.

And if you write that awesome book and Hollywood does come a knockin’...well, that’s just icing on the cake.

Film version of Entering Hades moving into production

Few debut titles make the noise that John Leake's Entering Hades (Farrar, Straus & Giroux/Sarah Crichton Books) made when it launched last fall.

Thanks in large part to the PR team at FSG, the book received great reviews from Entertainment Weekly, The Los Angeles Times, The New York Times and many others. It was also named one of the best books of 2007 by Men's Vogue. Leake was featured at the Texas Book Festival and did numerous interviews about the book when it launched last fall. It was one of our lead fall titles.

Variety is reporting this morning that Warnes Bros. is "hot for Leake's Entering Hades." Here is Michael Fleming's article:

"Warner Bros. has acquired the John Leake book "Entering Hades" and has attached Robert Schwentke to direct the adaptation.

The book, published late last year by Farrar, Straus & Giroux, is about Jack Unterweger, a journalist who led a double life strangling prostitutes in Vienna and Los Angeles, and covering his own crimes in the early 1990s. Unterweger hanged himself after receiving a life sentence.

Bob Cooper and Richard Saperstein will produce through their Landscape Entertainment and Elysium Films banners. Shara Kay will be executive producer.

"Robert, Richard and I want to do a movie that is more than a dark serial killer story," Cooper said. "This is about the power of celebrity, and what happens when this sociopath goes to Los Angeles, a city that is the prototype for reinvention."

Schwentke's latest film, "The Time Traveler's Wife," will be distributed by WB in 2009."

The book has had an ironic connection to Hollywood from the start, as the focus of Leake's work, Austrian serial killer and author Jack Unterweger, spent some time in Los Angeles shopping his manuscripts to producers in between killing women and interviewing LAPD officers.

He was firmly convinced his work should be on the silver screen.

Despite his flamboyant outfits, charisma and determination, Jack never inked a film deal in America. Something tells me he'd be ever so pleased that John Leake did.