Ted Kosmatka's "Prophet of Bones"

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Ted Kosmatka is the author of the novels The Games and the recently released Prophet of Bones. His short fiction has been nominated for both the Nebula Award and the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award, and appeared in numerous Year's Best collections.

Here Kosmatka dreamcasts an adaptation of Prophet of Bones:

For this exercise I enlisted the help of my family, who have all read the book, and we came to tense agreement about who might play the various roles. Paul Carlsson, the main character, was the hardest, so I’ll get to him last. For Paul’s father, I can see Stellan Skarsgård, from The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. For Paul’s mother, Zhang Ziyi from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. For James, “Herpetology, mate,” I can imagine Tony Curran playing that role well. For Margaret, I can picture Phoebe Tonkin filling the part.

The role of Joseph Martial Johansson was a tough one, and I can see it going in one of several different ways. Nick Nolte  would contribute the right amount of menace. Rutger Hauer could also play the part, I think, and add some important charisma to the role. Charles Dance from Game of Thrones could provide an aloof intellectualism to the character. Any of those three would be interesting, though for very different reasons.

For Gavin McMaster, we all agreed Jon Voight would be perfect. The baby-faced Ekman could be played by Travis Fimmel, of Ragnar the Viking fame (he does a great job of playing the part of charming-but-might-kill-you). Paul’s long lost girlfriend Lillivati could be played by Reshma Shetty, of the show Royal Pains.

And last but not least, I think Paul, like Martial, could be played in one of several different ways. British actor George Young could play a great Paul, I think, if he can pull off a good American accent. Actors Sam Tan and Daniel "Cloud" Campos might also nicely fit the part.

Learn more about the book and author at Ted Kosmatka's website.

Writers Read: Ted Kosmatka.

The Page 69 Test: The Games.

My Book, the Movie: The Games.

--Marshal Zeringue