I wouldn't call myself an avid reader. Very rarely do I find a book that sparks enough interest for me to want to read it. And on top of all the readings, I have to for school... I just can't find the time or the will to read for fun. However, with all this said, I still really do like reading when I get the chance to. I wish I did it more often or was better at it, but if there is one thing that I will always read, is a book that has a movie coming out on it.

This habit started for me as an experiment. I was much more anti-reading when I was younger and I never believed it when people would tell me that the book was always better than the movie. So for one book report project, one year, I decided to read the book Beastly by Alex Flinn. The movie was going to be out soon and typically I don't believe what anyone else says until I say it, so I decided to prove this theory to myself that books are indeed better than the movies.

So this book had sparked an interest in me before I had started actually reading and once I got started reading, I literally could not put the book down. I was shocked at how obsessed with this book I had gotten and I was super excited to see the movie I had playing in my head while reading be portrayed on the big screen in the theater. However, once I saw the movie, I walked out of the theater and... I wanted my money back. Not one thing was like the book and it completely ticked me off how twisted and trashed this story was as compared to its book version. I happily admitted that I was wrong to denying and questioning those who had warned me and from then on out I vowed I would never see a movie that I really really wanted to see and was excited about if it had a book written on it first. But also, I have to say, from then on out did things only get worse for books that had movies on them... Hollywood... WHY?!?!

So thing is, I get it... not all movies can be EXACTLY like the book or else it would be like a million hours long. And I get it Hollywood... you want things to be spiced up and prettied up so people will want to go see your movie. But isn't the originality of the book more than that? I mean it's the same thing as the movie you want to make, just in written form... oh wait, what do you call that? Um, a script maybe? That's basically what the book is. HELLOOOO.

The point I'm trying to make here is, is that you're making a movie from a best selling book so you know people have already read it, love it, are obsessed with it, and are excited about it to be made into a movie. But they want to see everything that they have already read about and already made a movie about based on what they read in their minds in real life. So get as many little details that you can sneak in right.

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green for example... "Perhaps okay will be our always." HOW HARD IS IT TO HAVE IT STAY MAYBE?!?!? The quote goes "MAYBE okay will be our always." "MAYBE!!!" WTF IS PERHAPS THERE FOR?!?! Just that one little, but crucial detail would have made a lot more of your audience happy. Otherwise, I will admit that TFIOS overall came pretty dang close to actually being the book.

But there are books that are completely and utterly ruined by their movies, and one example of that is Me Before You by Jojo Meyers. I absolutely loved this book and as impossible as it is to believe, I think I cried harder throughout this book than TFIOS. This book was like the adult, British version of that. And there were such mature and key points that made this book comprehend-able and really brought its purpose and story full circle. If you saw the movie though... I honestly don't feel like if I hadn't read the book, that I wouldn't be able to understand anything that was happening. The movie was such a disappointment and I feel that it underrepresented the rage, pain, and embarrassment that lied behind Will and lacked more of a backstory as to why he wanted to take his own life. In the book, Will snaps at Clark (Louisa) after she tries to take him to the races and why he hated being there so much. In the book, Clark didn't buy the tickets to the concert... Will did from his old times' friend that orchestrated the show and after the show, he chickened out of seeing his friend because he was embarrassed. And the movie totally left out Clark getting her bumble bee tattoo which was a major underlying theme throughout the book. Overall, this production on the movie had all the best to work with. Literally. There were literally no better actors and actresses that I could picture playing these parts, the scenery was breathtaking, the costumes... everything except the dang plot line. I really think that the ball was just really dropped on this one. Before I knew it it was over and like I said... I don't think there was a good enough backstory or information to support Will's choice.

Currently, I just finished the upcoming motion picture of Love, Simon's book Simon Vs The Homo Sapien's Agenda by Becky Albertalli. Oh, my god, the amount of cuteness in this book was like on steroids. I wanted Simon so bad... too bad he doesn't sway my way... obviously... but that's not the point. So I've seen the trailers for Love, Simon an endless amount of times on TV, but now having read the book, I've looked really close at the trailers (having not seen the movie yet) and oh my God did everything seem so wrong already! It was such a let down and I'm already debating asking for my money back for the movie and I haven't even bought my ticket yet. First off... Simon's email in the book is hourtohour.notetonote@gmail.com and I noticed in the trailer that... well it's NOT THE RIGHT ELLIOT SMITH SONG!!! WTF IS FROMMYWINDOW1@GMAIL.COM?!?! You may not have noticed that but I sure did! How is the Elliot Smith part which is a GINORMOUS detail in the book going to play out now? Simon better get his Elliot Smith band T-Shirt from Blue handing from his locker in this movie. And there's more where that came form that I picked up on just from the trailer. What's going on with Simon's Halloween costume? He's supposed to be a dementor so if that means Harry Potter is not refereed to in this movie that's even worse because that's a big part on how Simon realized he was gay, why does Nora look like she's in 5th Grade, Abby goes home with Simon after the party not Leah because Abby lives really far away, what the hell is Bram doing hooking up with a girl at the Halloween party (SPOILER ALERT!!! Bram is Blue and is barely grazed over to or refereed to directly in the book and Bram as Blue says that he's never kissed anybody and couldn't even picture himself even pretending to date a girl like Simon had... So what's going on there better not change the carnival scene in the book where Bram admits that he's Blue. That would be the biggest cinematic screw up in movie history.), and dear God they couldn't even get the basic dog breed right!

I really hope this movie doesn't turn out as bad as I'm predicting it to be, but with my past track record with reading books on movies... it doesn't look likely. It's not that hard Hollywood. You're still going to have people go out to see the movie, so why not give them what they are really hoping for? You'll get a lot better reviews from me that's for sure. If it ain't broke, don't fix it and best sellers like these books are best sellers for a reason so... why are you changing them so drastically? Things don't always have to end in a happy ending either. Like how you let Tris live at the end of the Divergent series when her ass died in the books... yea sorry not sorry... had to throw that out there because I was personally really looking forward to seeing if you had the balls to do that.

So Hollywood... please stop ruining my favorite books by trashing their movies. An inexperienced, unskilled armature shouldn't be able to make a better movie than you solely by reading the words of the page and picturing them in my mind.

But that's the point and purpose of a good book... if you are able to play your own movie in your head... that's how you know it really clicked with you and that you really liked it and submerged yourself in the story. Reading is a beautiful thing, and I encourage all of you to test out my experiment and challenge the theory that the books are always better than the movies. If you do then you will maybe be able to understand my frustrations a little bit better.

Okay. Rant over.