My Cinematic Novel Just Got That Much Closer to Cinema

Devoted to the TV! 
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Seven Noble Knights (Indie preorder) (Amazon preorder) has made it into the quarterfinals of the Road to Development Contest. I won't mention the website hosting it because I'm including below the highlights of their feedback, which I think they would prefer to remain anonymous. But come on, so many nice things about my book! I have to share! 

The Road to Development Contest is just that, a competition to be picked for development into a movie or TV show. I always thought Seven Noble Knights would do well as a series, either for streaming or on a cable network, or even, in the best of all possible worlds, on Masterpiece Theatre. The contest seems to agree (see comments below). 

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There is no social component to this contest. Seven Noble Knights has made it this far on its own merit, which makes me proud. But it also stands to reason that if my dear readers shared this news and the book made it to the top of internet searches, such exposure could influence the judges. I would be ever so grateful for such sharing. 

Seven Noble Knights would be an expensive proposition, so from a practical standpoint, I'm not sure what chances it really has at this skint point in human history. But no one can deny that it would be really super awesome to have a Seven Noble Knights series! 

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Feedback

Primary Hook of Story

A story of betrayal and revenge similar to some of the occurrences of Game of Thrones.

Fanbase Potential

It could, especially those interested in medieval stories, with knights, gorgeous ladies, tragic love, and sword fights.

Awards Potential

If well adapted, it could manage to earn some technical accolades, since the story would have to recreate an entire period.

Lead Characters

Most of them are brave, but some are cunning, some horribly hot-headed and some simply honest and honorable, which means that they are different, complex and well-established in the narrative.

Uniqueness of Story

The story is very well-written and developed. With a top-notch adaptation, it could become a great TV series or film.

Possible Formats

Film - Studio, TV Series - Cable, TV Series - Limited Run / Mini-Series, TV Series - Streaming

Comments

The narrative is good and compelling, and the author has great writing skills, which makes the book interesting throughout most of the reading, no matter what character you are following. In fact, the structure is also very well-developed. By following different characters and getting to know their needs and aspirations, no matter which side of the main issue they are on, we learn more about their personalities and realize there is no one completely right or wrong in the matter. The ending is particularly good, creating a reflection about how many of these people's struggles, grudges, sorrows and acts of revenge are based on actions that cannot be undone and lives that can't be recovered, creating a spiral of violence that seems to have no valid origin or reason to exist. All these things could be very well explored in a miniseries, especially if it would use each chapter to follow one of the characters, more or less like the book does. 

How the Battle of the Bastards is Like Seven Noble Knights

The photos in this post are publicity stills for Game of Thrones. 

I think most GoT fans were thrilled with Season 6, Episode 9, "The Battle of the Bastards." It held a special fascination for me because portions of it echoed my novel, Seven Noble Knights.

When Jon Snow was riding around with his troops, I realized for the first time that with the new hairdo and tidy beard, and especially wearing piles of furs, Kit Harington is a dead ringer for my hero, Mudarra. I watched with keen interest to see this Mudarra doppelganger play out some of the battle scenes from Seven Noble Knights. I'll go over them in the order they appear in my book.

This terrifying surround tactic takes place in Chapter VIIII, although I dare say it's even worse in Seven Noble Knights because the numbers are more drastically mismatched. You'll be wondering how they get out of it! So as not to spoil my novel, I'll just say it doesn't happen the way it does in GoT.

If I wasn't sure Seven Noble Knights had snuck onto the small screen without anyone's knowledge, this scene sealed it for me. In Seven Noble Knights, my heroes are unhorsed and overwhelmed, faced with markedly similar scenes to this one, and you're still rooting for them against these incredible odds.

When Jon Snow and Ramsay Bolton meet the day before the battle, I thought I was watching a scene from later in Seven Noble Knights, when Mudarra proposes single combat to decide the battle. This is something nice guys proposed in the Middle Ages to spare lives and resources. Again here, GoT doesn't follow the plot of my book, and Iwan Rheon doesn't look like my bad guy, Ruy Blásquez, either.

But wow, the good guy side of the aisle was insanely similar to what I had imagined. I don't know if I can explain what it feels like to have something you've written acted out on film, even unintentionally. In this case it was immensely exciting and satisfying, with a little bit of disconcerting because I know no one on the GoT staff has read Seven Noble Knights.

Let's hope this isn't the closest scrape Seven Noble Knights has with the moving pictures medium.

I'll be putting excerpts from Seven Noble Knights at the link as soon as I receive my galley proofs (yes, it's at that exciting stage!). You may see a battle scene that looks a little familiar if you're a GoT fan.

A few days remain in the Goodreads giveaway of two signed copies of Awash in Talent. Enter for your chance today!

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Awash in Talent

by Jessica Knauss

Giveaway ends June 30, 2016.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

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Winter's Tale Then and Now

I read Helprin's Winter'sTale the year before I graduated college on the recommendation of my thesis advisor in preparation for writing my thesis (which turned out to be the novella Tree/House). I'm sure it was recommended because of my interest in magical realism, but my reading of it went much farther than academic analysis, and like a lot of readers of this book, I experienced an enduring, gasping devotion to it long after I forgot what it was about. (If I ever knew. It's special in its inability to be pinpointed.) Even now, having moved a million times, I have Winter's Tale with me. I've gotten rid of a lot of stuff, but's non-negotiable. I tried to read other Helprin works, but they never worked out. Maybe I can only go through such a complex, transformative experience once.

Go to the microfiche for the really amazing discoveries.

Fast forward to 2014, and there's a movie of this unwieldy masterpiece. It was such a thrill when the first trailers came out. To think, someone dared to bring Winter's Tale to the cinema! I doubted it could be done — and apparently, so did everyone else! The reviews have been terrible.

I went to see it on opening day (Valentine's Day — thanks, sweetheart!) and the film is lovely to look at and highly sentimental, a perfect Valentine. If it weren't compared to the book, it wouldn't be judged so harshly. In fact, I'm not sure the two should be considered together because this goes beyond the usual cutting necessary for the visual medium. It's so simplified and reprocessed, it's hardly the same story at all.

I have personal reasons for being okay with the movie version being so much more linear and to the point. When I read the book, it encouraged me to see the world in a complicated, ritualized way I was already cultivating. But I went to see the film with my one true love, and our life is simple and our love is uncomplicated, so both art forms were a perfect match for the way things were going with me at the time.

A bad reason to like a movie that doesn't deliver even half the messages of its book? I don't think so. See the Winter's Tale movie with your true love and you'll see what I mean.

Read The Book Before You see the Movie! An Invisible Sign

I wanted to tell everyone who might not know that An Invisible Sign of My Own was a magnificently written, strangely real, and thrillingly odd novel by Aimee Bender before it became what looks like a pretty good movie, An Invisible Sign, with Jessica Alba, releasing May 6.

I read this book in the year 2000, in a library copy, and later bought a hardback when I had the means. I seized it off  the New Titles shelf as if there were a mob behind me, waiting to take it from me, because I had just come across Bender's short story collection The Girl in the Flammable Skirt, and every last one of them knocked me out cold. I had just completed an MFA in translation and then an MA in Medieval Studies, and not to knock the stuff I was translating and criticizing, but I hadn't read for pleasure for at least three years. I simply did not know that writing could be so wonderfully strange -- and still get published.

I was incredibly jealous.

Here I was, unemployed in my city of choice, hunched over a rickety table in the poorly wallpapered kitchen I shared with two roommates -- one of whom would tape the thermostat in place at just 55 degrees -- warmed by the energy of this book and saying "wow!" at every other word. The main character is incredibly observant, but can't make much sense of what she sees, so she takes refuge in the certainty of numbers. Haven't we all felt a little like that sometimes? Substitute words for numbers and that's me for most of my life. Through her job as a math teacher, she's thrown in among people and learns to make connections. The invisible sign has to do with someone in the neighborhood she sees hanging actual signs around his neck to alert everyone to his mood level -- not that anyone else understands the code.

That's a terrible synopsis. The really great thing about An Invisible Sign of My Own is the writing. I can't wait to see how it translates to film.

So anyway, read this amazing book. (Order it from Amazon by clicking the ad!) Then go see the movie.