Valerie Miner's "Traveling with Spirits"

Valerie Miner is the award-winning author of fourteen books. Her new novel is Traveling with Spirits. Other novels include After Eden, Range of Light, A Walking Fire, Winter’s Edge, Blood Sisters, All Good Women, Movement: A Novel in Stories, and Murder in the English Department. Her short fiction books include Abundant Light, The Night Singers and Trespassing. Her collection of essays is Rumors from the Cauldron: Selected Essays, Reviews and Reportage.

Here Miner dreamcasts an adaptation of Traveling with Spirits:

Oh yes, the movie. Or the mini-series. Well, I’m not holding out much hope. One of my novels, A Walking Fire, was optioned for a film, but eventually the director couldn’t get funding for it. “Not enough action,” the potential backers sighed. Now, this is a book in which a woman is arrested on the felony murder rule, a man is killed in a fire; another man dies. The novel digs deeply into questions of family loyalty and betrayal. And it’s a contemporary revision of King Lear, set in the U.S. during the War in Southeast Asia. Oh, war, did I mention there is war, as well, in this book that doesn’t have enough action?

Well, Traveling with Spirits is a literary novel following a character’s growth of consciousness, but it’s also about death, grief, romance, deep friendship, political intrigue. Seems to me it would make a great film—especially with the back and forth stories from Delhi to Minneapolis to Moorty, an Indian Hill Station. So let’s be optimistic and dream on about the film or the mini-series. When the movie of Traveling with Spirits is made, I see these people as the ideal cast:

Dr. Monica Murphy--Amy Ryan—she would convey the right balance of passion, reserve, self-reflection and sexiness.

Beata Johnson--Audra McDonald—she’s could play Monica’s powerful, beautiful best friend.

Marie Murphy--Ellen Burstyn would do a wonderful job portraying the good and complicated character of Monica’s immigrant Irish mother.

Sudha Badami--Nandita Das would be brilliant as the self-confident, generous, funny, loyal friend of Monica in Moorty, who has given up the lights of Bombay to teach in a small rural school.

Dr. Ashok Nair-- Irrfan Khan would offer nuance to the complex philosophy professor who courts (and perhaps wins over) the reluctant Monica.

Jeanne Murphy—Rosie O’Donnell would be great as Monica’s troubled, sassy younger sister.

Raul Sanchez—Javier Bardem would offer Monica’s Argentinean medical colleague the required combination of smoldering intelligence, hot-headed self-determination and deep concern for his patients.

Kevin Walsh—John Lithgow can play cantankerous. A perfect choice.

Brigid Walsh—Sally Field would be splendid as Kevin’s wife.

Father Daniel—Art Malik would be great as the Goan priest. I’ve been in love with Malik since The Jewel and the Crown.

I’d love to see the film directed by Mira Nair, Deepa Mehta or Sofia Coppola. I could also see it as a four part series. On with the dreaming.

Learn more about the book and author at Valerie Miner's website and Facebook page.

Writers Read: Valerie Miner.

--Marshal Zeringue

Jeff Somers's "Chum"

Jeff Somers was born in Jersey City, New Jersey and regrets nothing. He is the author of the Avery Cates series of novels published by Orbit Books and The Ustari Cycle books Trickster and Fabricator (Pocket Books). He sold his first novel at age 16 to a tiny publisher in California which quickly went out of business and has spent the last two decades assuring potential publishers that this was a coincidence. Somers publishes a zine called The Inner Swine and has also published a few dozen short stories; his story “Ringing the Changes” was selected for Best American Mystery Stories 2006, edited by Scott Turow and his story “Sift, Almost Invisible, Through” appeared in the anthology Crimes by Moonlight, published by Berkley Hardcover and edited by Charlaine Harris.

Here Somers dreamcasts an adaptation of his new novel, Chum:

The problem with casting your book is that Hollywood pre-selects for gorgeous, and none of my characters as conceived, with a few exceptions, are that good-looking. Probably because they’re all based on me in some way.

I never actually think about casting my book as I write and don’t have actors in mind as I create characters. Sometimes I use an actor as a physical template, but that’s not quite the same thing. After the book is done, though, it’s a lot of fun. I always imagine Chum as a POV film, where each sequence is shot from the POV of the character. I have no idea if that would be a good idea in practice, because I don’t make movies for a living.

We also have to get one thing straight: If someone pays me, say, three or four of those big bags marked with a green dollar sign in exchange for the film rights, they can cast whoever they want. They can cast Justin Bieber and all five of the One Direction kids and make it into a musical. They can cast Miley Cyrus in the male lead if they toss a few more bags onto the pile. I’ve heard of authors who have something referred to as “artistic integrity.” I do not know and do not wish to know what that is. I have a taste for top-shelf liquor and if Corey Haim sees Chum as his comeback vehicle and backs a dump truck full of gold coins onto my lawn, the movie is his.

Still, for fun: Let’s see ... the protagonist is Henry, no last name given. Henry’s a bit of a dummy and imagines he’s a good guy right up until the universe teaches him otherwise. I think Ryan Gosling has the right perplexed expression on his face for this character, though he’s likely too good-looking. We could tweeze off some hair, though, and get him into the zone.

For the evil plotting drink-stirring straw of the book, Tom Wallace, I see Tom Hardy if he can chisel the accent off. His voice is ideal, and as long as he’d be willing to also chisel off some muscles and do a Raging Bull turn with his belly, we’d be in business.

The other main male character, Dave “Bick” Bickerman, is touchy, as he’s not presented as a good-looking guy, is easily an alcoholic, and is kind of unlikable. Obviously this is a job for a slightly younger Joel McHale. Or maybe we could pass of McHale’s age as the effects of a lifestyle that would kill mortal men.

For the women of the book, I see Mary Elizabeth Winstead as an ideal Denise. She’s pretty and sarcastic but in a very unthreatening way. And for the dually doomed Harrows sisters, Mary and Miriam, I think the Fanning sisters would be great. By the time a film version got off the ground Elle Fanning would likely be the precise right age.

Then again, if producers came to me and said Brad Pitt wanted to see if he could still play a 30-year old, I’d be too busy bathing in a tub filled with gold coins to care.

Learn more about the book and author at Jeff Somers's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

Yona Zeldis McDonough's "Two of a Kind"

Yona Zeldis McDonough is the author of the novels A Wedding in Great Neck, Breaking the Bank, In Dahlia's Wake, and The Four Temperaments, as well as numerous books for children.

Here she dreamcasts an adaptation of her new novel, Two of a Kind:

Oh, what fun it is for writers to visualize actors bringing their characters to life; I do it all the time and know other writers do too. For the leads in Two of a Kind, I’d love to have seen either of the Hepburns—Katharine or Audrey—play Christina Connelly because both have the slender grace and poise that the character possesses. Jumping to the present, I’d go for Alicia Silverstone—she has the right delicate, refined features. For Andy Stern, I’d like to see Chris Meloni from Law and Order SVU because he has that scrappy nature and slightly rough edge that I think is essential to the character. Andy’s 80+ mother makes an appearance in the book and for her, I’d love to see Ruth Gordon or Ellen Burstyn--both sassy, gutsy ladies. Since there are also two teenagers who have major roles in this book, I am seeing Jeremy White (Shameless) for Oliver; love that kid! For Jordan, I imagine the lovely and ethereal Dakota Fanning.

Learn more about the author and her work at Yona Zeldis McDonough's website.

Read--Coffee with a Canine: Yona Zeldis McDonough & Queenie, Willa and Holden.

The Page 69 Test: A Wedding in Great Neck.

Writers Read: Yona Zeldis McDonough.

My Book, The Movie: A Wedding in Great Neck.

--Marshal Zeringue

Renee Swindle's "Shake Down The Stars"

Renee Swindle is the author of the novels Shake Down The Stars and Please Please Please.

She earned her BA from UC Irvine and MFA in creative writing from San Diego State University, and now lives in Oakland, California with her two dogs and three cats.

Here Swindle dreamcasts an adaptation of Shake Down The Stars:

Shake Down The Stars involves a woman who is stuck in life. She can’t stay away from her ex-husband. She isn’t attentive to the high school students she teaches. And she’s been drinking too much and seeking out unsuitable men. Piper’s mother, married to a celebrity evangelist, and her sister, immersed in plans to wed a professional football player and star in a reality TV show, are both too self-absorbed to sympathize with Piper’s angst. They tell her to get a grip. But Piper has suffered from an unimaginable blow: five years ago, a car accident took the life of her young daughter.

When Piper’s ex-husband announces his new girlfriend is pregnant, Piper is forced to take stock. And despite what she thinks, Piper can’t do it alone. Lucky for her, a couple of crazy, funny new friends are ready to step in when she needs them most…and show her how to live and laugh again. There’s actually a lot of laughter in the book, by the way.

I realized as I dreamt up the cast for Shake Down the Stars that I didn’t know young Hollywood all that much. I had to call on friends to help me find the best actors and actresses to audition. We ultimately came up with a sexy cast, and now all I want is for everyone to visualize someone in Hollywood buying the rights to my novel. Let’s make this happen, people! It would be great to see a cast like this come to life!

Piper: Gabrielle Union.

Spencer: Omari Hardwick (The A-Team, Kick Ass, Middle of Nowhere).

Selwyn: Kevin Hart.

Margot: Kat Graham (The Vampire Diaries).

Curtis (Margot’s fiancé): Brian J. White (The Cabin in the Woods, Good Deeds).

Piper's mother: Angela Basset.

Piper’s stepfather, The Reverend: Courtney B. Vance (who’s coincidentally married to Angela Bassett).

Danielle (Margot’s best friend): Megan Fox.

Sharayray (student): Kyla Pratt (My friend pointed Kyla Pratt out to me. I think she’d be great.)

Tisa (Spencer’s girlfriend): Jurnee Smollett-Bell (Friday Night Lights, Temptation).

Mr. Hoffman: Dustin Hoffman (I imagined Dustin Hoffman while writing the character, hence naming him “Hoffman”).

Coco: Octavia Spencer.

Clem: Susan Sarandon or if played younger Connie Britton (Friday Night Lights/Nashville).

Gladys (school principal): Loretta Devine.

Learn more about the book and author at Renee Swindle's website and blog.

Read--Coffee with a Canine: Renee Swindle & Mocha and Nikki.

--Marshal Zeringue

Catherine Gilbert Murdock's "Heaven Is Paved with Oreos"

Catherine Gilbert Murdock grew up on a small farm in Connecticut and now lives in suburban Philadelphia with her husband, two brilliant unicycling children, several cats, and a one-acre yard that she is slowly transforming into a wee, but flourishing ecosystem. She is the author of several books, including the popular Dairy Queen series starring lovable heroine D. J. Schwenk, Princess Ben, and Wisdom's Kiss.

About her new novel, Heaven Is Paved with Oreos, from the publisher:

Fourteen-year-old Sarah Zorn intends to spend the Wisconsin summer with her “boyfriend” Curtis, waiting for a dead calf named Boris to decompose in time for the science fair. Her plans upend, however, when her fake-boyfriend strategy goes seriously awry just as her hippie Grandma Z invites her on a last-minute Roman holiday. As Sarah explores Italy’s ancient wonders, she can’t stop “boy-liking” Curtis ... or puzzling over her grandmother’s odd behavior. Written as Sarah’s journal, this satisfying middle grade novel navigates the murky waters of first love, friendship, and family with heart and good humor.

Here Murdock dreamcasts an adaptation of Heaven Is Paved with Oreos:

Ooooh, who would play my characters in a movie ... I love this.

Sarah would be played by a girl I met in Madison, Wisconsin, about four years ago. She's too old for the part now, and of course she's not a household name, but she had this wide-eyed wonder about the world, and writing, that I found absolutely charming. Think of an extremely young and innocent Heather Graham.

Z could be any number of amazing actresses of a certain age ... Diane Keaton, perhaps? This question is much harder than I thought it would be!

I do know one thing: Skandar Keynes would play Tips in Wisdom's Kiss, my last book. I'm pretty sure I wrote the part with him in mind.

Learn more about the book and author at Catherine Gilbert Murdock's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

Joshua Safran's "Free Spirit"

Joshua Safran is an attorney, writer, speaker, and occasional rabbi, and was featured in the award-winning documentary Crime After Crime, which premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival and had its television debut as part of the Oprah Winfrey Network (OWN)'s Documentary Film Club. He is a nationally recognized champion for women's rights and a zealous advocate for survivors of domestic violence and the wrongfully imprisoned. For his work he has received national media coverage and numerous awards. He lives in Oakland, California.

Here Safran shares some ideas about an adaptation of his new book, Free Spirit: Growing Up On the Road and Off the Grid:

Like most everything I do, I went about writing my first book all backwards. First came the film, then the book. Sort of. The 2011 documentary Crime After Crime profiled my seven-year struggle to free a battered woman from prison. The film premiered at Sundance and had its television debut on the Oprah Winfrey Network. In one scene in Crime After Crime I talk about my own experiences with domestic violence as a kid and how overcoming that adversity led me to devote myself to pro bono work. The film also explores the strength that I draw from my Jewish faith. My book Free Spirit: Growing Up On the Road and Off the Grid is very much a back story to those scenes, telling the story of how my feminist radical mother ended up married to a violent alcoholic guerrilla fighter/shaman/poet, how we survived the years of abuse at his hands, and my unlikely reconnection with my Jewish heritage in the process. The book also brings readers on a journey through my years of hitchhiking across the American west with my mother, chasing her vision of an anarcho-syndicalist utopia, and encountering strange and outlandish characters along the way.

In preparation for my September 10, 2013 book launch, I teamed up with the producer and director of Crime After Crime, Yoav Potash, to create a short Hollywood-style film about the book. We were very fortunate to find an amazing cast and crew and filmed about 50 reenactments from my childhood in August. It was very surreal casting and directing actors to play my childhood-self, but we were blessed to find two child actors – Yonim Schweig and his brother Daniel – who perfectly captured the character and naturally fit the part at different ages. We also found uncannily talented actors who fully inhabited the roles of my mother (Jenn Tripp), stepfather (Xavier Galindo), and "Uncle" Tony (Mario de Alba), as well as a whole galaxy of stellar supporting performers. Our actors' were so talented that I found myself re-experiencing childhood wonder as I watched myself and my mother cuddling with lambs in the back of a pickup truck, and I found it very difficult to watch the domestic violence scenes as my stepfather brutalized my mother all over again.

I believe that using this type of short film to promote a book is the first of its kind and hope that it will allow audiences to connect with the stories and characters from the book at a deeper level. I would love to evolve our short film project into a feature-length movie. I would also love to team up with Jenji Kohan to produce a multi-season television series based on my childhood. She is uniquely qualified since she specializes in showcasing counter-cultural women leads like my mother and shares the same blend of humor and heartbreak that flows through my writing, and she is a master of blending the dark side of the Age of Aquarius with Judaism.

View still images from the Free Spirit short film: showing Young Joshua (Yonim Schweig) how to operate the rifle for the final confrontation with Joshua's stepfather; setting up a reenactment of the 1982 Rainbow Gathering in Idaho with Very Young Joshua (Daniel Schweig), Prophet Gregory (Keith Carlisle), with the real Joshua Safran as an extra and Butterfly (Melita Silberstein) in the background; directing Stepfather Leopoldo (Xavier Galindo) from a sinking paddleboat with Young Joshua (Yonim Schweig) in the foreground. All photos by Jaime Lastimosa.

Learn more about the book and author at Joshua Safran's website.

The Page 99 Test: Free Spirit.

--Marshal Zeringue

April Genevieve Tucholke's "Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea"

April Genevieve Tucholke digs classic movies, red-headed villains, big kitchens, and discussing murder at the dinner table. She and her husband Nate Pedersen live in Oregon at the edge of a forest.

Here she dreamcasts an adaptation of her new novel, Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea:

I haven’t actually done this yet. Cast my characters. Not even in my mind, during an idle moment while waiting in line or staring out a car window. But there’s no time like the present…

Violet: Hailee Steinfeld. She isn’t blond and blue-eyed like my main character, but who cares. She has Violet’s wide-eyed, quiet depth. I loved this girl in True Grit. She just blew me away.

Neely. The laughing brother with the temper and the heart of gold: Anton Yelchin. He rocked his role in both J. J. Abrams’s Star Trek movies, but it was his riveting gravitas in Terminator Salvation that killed me.

Brodie: A friend recently pointed out to me that Caleb Landry Jones (Friday Night Lights, Antiviral) would make the perfect Brodie. He somehow looks innocent and terrifying at the same time. Eddie Redmayne would also fit the bill to a T, if he were a bit younger.

And River. The charming liar. Aaron Taylor-Johnson. I’ve had my eye on Aaron since he played the younger version of Edward Norton’s magician character in The Illusionist. Just watch him in this REM video.  There’s something about the cocky, crazy, vulnerable look in his eyes that is just so River. Yeah, this kid. He’s got the sparks. All of them.

Learn more about the book and author at April Genevieve Tucholke's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

Mary Kay Zuravleff's "Man Alive!"

Mary Kay Zuravleff is the author of The Bowl Is Already Broken, which the New York Times praised as “a tart, affectionate satire of the museum world’s bickering and scheming,” and The Frequency of Souls, which the Chicago Tribune deemed “a beguiling and wildly inventive first novel.” Honors for her work include the American Academy’s Rosenthal Award and the James Jones First Novel Award, and she has been nominated for the Orange Prize.

Here Zuravleff dreamcasts an adaptation of her new novel, Man Alive!:

In atmospherics alone, Man Alive! is a natural for the big screen. As a fast-moving storm closes in on the beach, the novel opens with Dr. Owen Lerner being struck by lightning as he puts a quarter in the parking meter on his family's last night of vacation. The child psychiatrist is literally thrown into the air; however, aside from his searing pain, Dr. Lerner is enamored of his experience. In fact, all he wants to do now is barbecue, in hopes of capturing the heavenly smell that he associates with the moment he was struck.

Owen's wife, Toni, and their three children are desperate for him to be himself once again, but he's not convinced he should be medicating kids the way he used to. And as it happens, now he exhibits many of the problems he's known for treating, because people recovering from lightning have problems with ADD, ADHD, PTSD, and traits associated with autism. How far can he drift from his past life before everything falls apart?

Because the novel reveals the fragile eco-system of family life, I pick Valerie Faris and Jonathan Dayton as the movie's directors. Who better than a married couple to dramatize Toni and Owen's struggle? This team's brilliant Little Miss Sunshine wrings the same painful humor from family life that I'm trying to capture.

Robert Downey Jr., if he is willing to gain a few pounds, is my choice for Owen, a wry and wise shrink to kids and teens. (There would be added value in his possibly knowing about the many drugs Dr. Lerner dispenses.) Also, I recently heard Downey sing! Owen is a soundtrack fan, so there may have to be singing.

Either Mary-Louise Parker or Parker Posey should play Toni Lerner, an attractive renegade who is devoted to family over lifestyle or status. Her straight-talking approach, while never sarcastic, can sometimes seem flip--Toni is to the other mothers as these actresses are to slick Hollywood types. Smoky-voiced Chloë Grace Moretz, Jack Donaghy's nemesis on 30 Rock, is how I see Brooke, the Lerners's smart teenage daughter who, feeling completely ignored in the wake of her father's accident, enters a dangerous relationship with a fellow-gymnast named Natalio (take a look at Diego González-Boneta). Brooke's older brothers, identical twins at two different colleges, get into their own heartbreaking trouble. Based solely on his appearance (which I suppose I'm allowed to do), Jeremy Sumpter is the tall, surfer-dude math nerds Will and Ricky, whose birth order is flipped when the younger twin is the one who revives their dad. Ricky's mythology professor is up for grabs, as is Will's voluptuous girlfriend, Kyra, who may or may not have had sex with Owen.

With music by T-Bone Burnett & company. I'd not only see the movie but also buy the soundtrack.

Learn more about the book and author at Mary Kay Zuravleff's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

Dale M. Kushner's "The Conditions of Love"

Dale M. Kushner grew up in Maplewood, New Jersey, but the forested landscape of her adopted state, Wisconsin, is an inspiration. The natural world, Carl Jung, and Buddhism have been major influences on her work. She is on the faculty of The Assisi Institute, a Jungian think-tank in Vermont and will become the Poetry Editor for The Journal of Pastoral Care & Counseling in the fall of 2013. Her most recent collection of poetry, More Alive Than Lions Roaring, is currently looking for a home.

Here Kushner dreamcasts an adaptation of The Conditions of Love, her debut novel:

Once upon a time, movies shaped my education. Fiction held first place as a guide to life’s vicissitudes, but the classic movies of the thirties, forties, and fifties I watched repeatedly on our old Admiral TV. The actors of those films had a presence that refused to fade after the movie ended. Their characters and the situations they managed were archived in my mind as cautionary tales to be revisited when the occasion arose. Mern, one of my central characters in The Conditions of Love, is also infatuated with movie stars. Her greatest ambition is to go to Hollywood (the Hollywood of the fifties) and be discovered at Schwab’s drugstore like Lana Turner. One of my favorite lines in the novel is when she tells a friend, “Why be Betty Crocker when you can be Betty Bacall?”

With nostalgia in mind, here are my choices for actors to play in a film version of my novel.

For Eunice, my narrator, as a young girl, Natalie Wood as a child star. Eunice in her older years, Lauren Bacall.

As Mern, Eunice’s quirky and sometime malicious mother, Shelley Winters age 25.

As Eunice’s charming and dangerous father, Frankie, a young Frank Sinatra.

As Rose, the mysterious woman who rescues Eunice, Colleen Dewhurst or Ida Lupino.

As Sam, Mern’s devoted boyfriend, Karl Malden.

As Fox, Eunice’s older lover, Richard Burton in his youth.

Happily, there have been some film folks sniffing at the book and if anyone’s looking, here are some contemporary actors I think would be smashing in the film:

Maggie Gyllenhaal as Mern.

Daniel Day Lewis as Fox. (If only Jeremy Irons was a tad younger!)

Philip Seymour Hoffman as Sam.

Juliette Binoche as Rose.

John Hawkes as Frankie.

Young Eunice, Kiernan Shipka of Mad Men fame; the older Eunice, Naomi Watts.

It’s been great to have the opportunity to imagine characters I love embodied on film. Mern is over-the-moon happy about the attention.

Learn more about the book and author at Dale Kushner's website, blog, and Facebook page.

Writers Read: Dale M. Kushner.

The Page 69 Test: The Conditions of Love.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eric Gansworth's "If I Ever Get Out of Here"

Eric Gansworth is a Professor of English and Lowery Writer-in-Residence at Canisius College in Buffalo, New York. An enrolled member of the Onondaga Nation, he was born and raised at the Tuscarora Reservation in Niagara County in upstate New York. His short stories, poetry, and nonfiction have been printed and reprinted in many literary magazines and anthologies, and his dramatic work has appeared at the Public Theater in New York City.

Here Gansworth dreamcasts an adaptation of his new YA novel, If I Ever Get Out of Here:

There seem to be many things against the realistic possibility, so I’m going to have to go into total fantasy-land for this one. This novel, adapted, would need to have an indie film aesthetic with a Michael Bay budget. So in my fantasy-land, all the Beatles and Paul McCartney music has been cleared for inclusion, as I can’t see it without those songs meaningfully in place. McCartney would also give permission for excerpts of his concert film, Rockshow, for the Wings concert scene. Even the choice of actors would be tricky. The tradition seems to be having child actors play child characters, but then, strangely, twentysomething actors are often cast to play high school age characters. Certainly, plenty of actors manage. Michael Angarano was a believable high school student in the adaptation of Stewart O’Nan’s Snow Angels, and he was twenty at the time.

I think we’ve been trained by popular culture to accept young looking adults are credible teens. Most of us don’t have occasion to jump back into that environment in the midst of an average school day. But when I was writing this novel, I visited some friends who teach at my old high school. I’m not an especially tall man--okay, in fact, I’m short. Yet, while walking those halls, I felt incredibly tall. The sensation made me realize that, when I was fourteen, fifteen, maybe even seventeen, I thought I looked like an adult.

This is mystifying in retrospect. I suppose the delusion sustains because all of our peers are, more or less, the same size, and we reject the visual information that teachers, parents, older siblings, are much larger than we are. So maybe that self-delusion allows us to accept the casting of thirty year olds as high school students. Consequently, I’m not sure I can even imagine what sort of actors would be perfect. I’d want Lewis and George to seem worldly and vulnerable at the same time, vividly present but also appropriately diminutive, not as in control of their worlds as they’d like.

Even if none of those things were possible, if each permission were refused, and all the available actors were over thirty, I still think Atom Egoyan would make an amazing film. He has this incredible ability to make narratively challenging films that, in their stylistic inventiveness--perhaps because of that boldness--they get to the truths of the stories. Also, he’s from Toronto, and deals with the snowy north in such a way that you could watch one of his winter scenes in August and still feel slightly hypothermic. His adaptation of Russell Banks’ The Sweet Hereafter is by no means a literal translation, and yet, for all its divergences from the novel, the changes he made added to my understanding of its richness and complexity. I’d love to see the David Lynch or David Cronenberg version, to witness the horrifying subtext I’m maybe not even aware of, but Egoyan’s particular lens of isolated rural life and disconnection, even among the closest of relations, to me, would be the perfect refractor for this novel’s heart.

Learn more about the book and author at Eric Gansworth's website.

--Marshal Zeringue