Book To Film #NetflixKids Style

Review it Rah-shay By Feb 23, 2014 40 Comments

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My daughter and I had a very lazy weekend. Initially I felt some guilt at the amount of time we spent at home watching television but I realized that the majority of our viewing was related to books and I wanted to share some of the things my teen and I checkout this weekend while watching Netflix.

Ever After High

Shannon Hale’s Ever After High: The Storybook of Legends was a huge hit with my daughter. When we got an advanced reader’s copy of the book she devoured the story of the children of fairy tale characters. She was sympathetic to Raven Queen’s unhappiness with her destiny of being “evil” and her dilemma of changing the fate of other characters should Raven alter her own destiny. I haven’t read the book yet but loved the extension of the world of fairy tale characters. The cartoon is cute; full of puns, hidden jokes and fun characters.

About Ever After High: The Ever After High storyline is based on the children of famous fairytale characters attending high school. The children are destined to follow in their parents’ footsteps to keep their stories alive through generations. If they do not, their stories will cease to exist and they will disappear.

 

Battle Royale

Admittedly this is not for all audiences but The Bee and I enjoyed the movie and have enjoyed the book. Battle Royale: The Novel is the story of junior high school students who are forced to fight each other to the death in a program run by the authoritarian Japanese government, now known as the Republic of Greater East Asia. This movie is a cross between Stephen King’s The Long Walk and Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games series. Be warned, there is graphic, gratuitous violence but there is also a story about survival, human kindness and interaction and how fear will make people react differently to things.

 

Vampire Diaries

I will admit that I have become a bit “vampired” out as soon as my daughter has started to become enchanted with vampires. The Bee had begun reading The Awakening (The Vampire Diaries, Vol. 1) and has introduced me to the series and re-introduced me to a world of vampires.  While I am feeling lukewarm to vampires, it warms my heart that my teen is starting to read books with plots featuring love triangles. I fondly remember my lazy afternoons as a teen reading and re-reading my favorite books featuring unrequited love and hoping that the right one was picked.

About The Vampire Diaries: The series follows the protagonist Elena Gilbert (Nina Dobrev) as she falls in love with vampire Stefan Salvatore (Paul Wesley) and is drawn into the supernatural world as a result. As the series progresses, Elena finds herself drawn to Stefan’s brother Damon Salvatore (Ian Somerhalder) resulting in a love triangle.

 

Hugo

The year that The Invention of Hugo Cabret won The Caldecott Award, I had a child walking around with this huge book telling me all about how she was glad she wasn’t an orphan.

About Hugo: The plot of Hugo is about a boy who lives alone in the Gare Montparnasse railway station in Paris. It is directed and co-produced by Martin Scorsese and adapted for the screen by John Logan. The film stars Asa Butterfield, Chloë Grace Moretz, Ben Kingsley, Sacha Baron Cohen, Helen McCrory, Ray Winstone, Emily Mortimer, Jude Law, and Christopher Lee. We both agreed that we didn’t enjoy the movie as much as we loved the book but it’s still a good movie to spark a discussion about automaton’s. (I voted for something that would do the dishes and The Bee thought we there should be an automaton to do some of her homework).

 

Avalon High

Seriously? What can’t Meg Cabot do? First she enchanted me, er, us with Princess Mia and The Princess Diaries. Now her series, Avalon High, combines fantasy, magic, King Arthur and high school. We have a twist on who rules the kingdom and a re-imagining of Camelot.

About Avalon High: Ellie Harrison has just moved to Annapolis, Maryland. Her new school, Avalon High, seems like a typical high school with the stereotypical students: Lance the jock, Jennifer the cheerleader, Marco, the bad boy/desperado, and Will, the senior class president, quarterback, the student every girl wants and all around good guy. But not everyone at Avalon High is who they appear to be, not even Ellie herself.

 

While we can enjoy time together watching television and sharing books, I am enjoying time with my teen to chat about books, characters and her point of view about images we see. It’s been a very good couple of days to learn about new books, revisit series and have some unscheduled downtime.
netflix teen books

 

 

Tell me…what are you reading or hoping to see come to life? Let me know in the comments!

-r

Disclosure: Affiliate links are used in this post. If you click on the link and make a purchase, I will make a small commission. 

 

Author

I am mom, daughter, sister, yarn lover, word lover, crazy cat lady and library chick. Find me with book or with hook and a hot cuppa.

40 Comments

  1. Terry says:

    My Granddaughters, who are in college like the Vampire Diaries. I haven’t read them and probably won’t. The kids today like all the vampire things.

    1. Rachee says:

      I had to take a break from vampires and it was with GREAT reluctance that I agreed to start watching again! Hopefully these aren’t sparkly.

  2. We LOVE Netflix. There is SO much stuff for kids on there – and adults, too!!

    1. Rachee says:

      I have to say Netflix doesn’t owe me anything! Before I was a member of the stream team I totally got my money’s worth.

  3. Rosey says:

    I’ve seen Hugo and liked it. My son and his wife have Netflix and they love it!

  4. GossipMoms says:

    My family & I love netflix, we always have something to watch, but love the Vampire Diaries

  5. Anita Breeze says:

    I think Netflix is the best thing ever! Such a bargain for so many awesome shows! I haven’t seen the ones you mentioned here, but I’m sure I will get to them.

  6. Maria Lopez-Castro says:

    I love that you are enjoying this time to share and discuss with your daughter. It is so important to maintain communication open with your kids during those teenage years.

    1. Rachee says:

      In the beginning I felt bad for using TV as a common ground but it has helped shape our chats. Plus she feels like she can share without being judged. Anything to keep her talking.

  7. Scott says:

    We haven’t sprung for Netflix yet, but the kids are starting to ask about it. Looks like it is in our near future.

    1. Rachee says:

      I got rid of cable and just stream with Netflix. Seriously! It is totally worth it.

  8. I haven’t seen any of these but Hugo. I absolutely loved that movie though. I watch Netflix every Friday and Saturday night. 🙂

  9. I love being able to customize Netflix to each of my kids as they are in different age groups. We use Netflix on Roku and are currently in a temporary house that has Apple TV, I can not wait to get back to using Roku as it is not working well on Apple TV 🙁 I miss Netflix!

  10. kay adeola says:

    Keep meaning to join netflix but we have so much stuff to watch already lol i love vampire diaries.

  11. Emily says:

    We should join Netflix again! I can’t believe how much great stuff is available there.

    Don’t feel guilty about a lazy weekend – they’re good for the soul!

  12. becca says:

    I would love to see the Thirst series come to life or the wicked series about the fairies.

  13. Theresa says:

    I love it when books become film. It’s so fun to see your favorite characters come to life. My daughter is getting into the Ever After High dolls lately, and I just saw they have it on Netflix. We will probably catch it after dinner some night this week!

    1. Rachee says:

      She’s going to love Shannon Hale!

  14. My sister in law loves Vampire Diaries but I have yet to watch them! I do have Netflix so I’ll have to start!

  15. Pam says:

    I always love when true murder mysteries are made into movies. They are a big favorite of both my husband and myself. We use Netflix stream all the time. My husband seems to be addicted and has been streaming “Stalked” and watching those.

    1. Rachee says:

      I LOVE stalked! I am such a fan of true crime!

  16. Lawna says:

    I did not realize that Avalon High was related to a book. Seems like you and your daughter watched some very interesting things.

  17. Nicole A. says:

    I’m not reading anything right now, sadly. But when books become movies I like to read the book before seeing the movie.

  18. Teresa Moody says:

    All of those series are awesome! My daughter loves the Ever after high. She read the Monster High books as well.

  19. Triplezmom says:

    Those series look so good. And fun. I can’t wait until my girl is a little older and her books get a little more interesting. Though she did get me to read Matilda and that was pretty fun. On my own I’m reading Longbourn, which is about the servants from Pride and Prejudice.

  20. We recently got Netflix at home. Prior to that we didn’t watch tv much, we usually just stream shows from the internet but there isn’t a lot of things we could view from our area! I’m so glad we got Netflix. Don’t think I’ve read any of the book series you’v mentioned!

  21. Pam W says:

    My daughter was a fan of anything Meg Cabot when she was younger. Although the books are always better, I do love a good book-to-screen movie sometimes!

  22. that Ever After High sound super fun! I love when my kids get into books and just love htem. And they get excited when the books get turned into movies. right now I”m hooked on a Hallmark new TV series based on the books When calls the heart. Such a girly thing. But I love it.
    I also love that some of my favorite books are turned into movies like Enders Game, Hunger Games, Divergent, Percy Jackson, etc.

    I have been wondering what other fun things I could find for my kids to watch on Netflix, and you just gave me some fantastic ideas! Thank you!

  23. Sarah Bailey says:

    I have to admit I haven’t heard of a lot of these (I’m obviously getting out of touch) I have to admit I do love a good book turned into a film 🙂 x

  24. DD says:

    We love Netflix at our house, especially the netflix series.

  25. Le-an Lacaba says:

    Thanks for the movie reviews. Now I have a whole new list of must watch!

  26. Very cool! I've been a loyal Netflix subscriber for years – love it!

  27. That's a great way to spend the weekend just hanging with your favorite teenager watching back to back movies

  28. amanda says:

    I haven’t watched any of these recently. In a few years my kids will start reading more and then watch movies.

  29. Amanda Smith says:

    I do marathons….Netflix marathons 🙂 Netflix has been a must in our house for years! Love it!

  30. Eliz Frank says:

    A lot of people are into the Vampire series but its not for me… I appreciate the fascination…

  31. What a fun way to spend some time with your daughter. I love all those movies!

  32. erin says:

    What a great way to spend a weekend. I love all of those movies. Marathons rock.

  33. That sounds like such a great way to supplement what she is learning through reading AND to make reading more fun.

    I’m biased in this response because my sister recently published her first novel, Tales of the Anna Khonda, by Allyson Mayze … so of course I’d love to see her book come to life! 🙂

  34. Ashley Gill says:

    We love Netflix! My daughter told me this past week that she is old enough for Every After High… I will have to watch it before she does and with Netflix, I can do just that!

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