Here Higgins dreamcasts an adaptation of her new novel, The Perfect Match:I’m not going to pretend here—Tom Hardy was the inspiration for the hero of The Perfect Match to the point where I now own a Tom Hardy calendar. I even named my hero Tom, which I thought was a solid blue-collar name. Tom Barlow is from Manchester, England, the only son of a butcher, and put himself through school on a boxing scholarship. I have a thing for the movie Warrior, as well as 124 pictures of young Mr. Hardy on my computer. Tom Hardy has such appeal as a romantic lead—when I saw This Means War, I was a little stunned that the heroine goes with the other guy (not that there’s anything wrong with Chris Pine, but please! He’s no Tom Hardy.)Learn more about the book and author at Kristan Higgins's website, blog, and Facebook page.
What I love about Tom Hardy is that he can convey both a smokin’ alpha male and a very adorable boy-next-door. In my book, Tom Barlow is some of both—he’s trying very hard to stay close to his “unofficial stepson,” a teenage boy whose late mother was Tom’s fiancée. What woman could resist giving him a green card by way of marriage? But Tom’s got quite an edge, too, which was very fun to write.
For Honor, it was a little harder to choose an actress, but in the end, I went with Laura Linney. She was so magnificent in Love Actually (and everything she does, really), and I like that she’s a bit underappreciated. Honor is the person in her family who gets things done, but she’s got a romantic heart and a whole lot of yearning. Laura Linney is just fantastic at conveying ten emotions at once…to me, she’s second only to Meryl Streep in terms of acting chops. Honor doesn’t suffer fools gladly, and she doesn’t let Tom get away with his usual shtick, so I think Ms. Linney would do a great job portraying her.
My Book, The Movie: Somebody to Love.
--Marshal Zeringue