Linda Grimes's "In a Fix"

Linda Grimes is a former English teacher and ex-actress now channeling her love of words and drama into writing. She grew up in Texas and currently resides in northern Virginia with her husband.Here she shares some ideas for a big screen adaptation of her new novel, In a Fix:I suppose most writers have imagined—either with excitement or horror—Hollywood zeroing in on one of their books and splashing it onto the screen. I'm no exception. But I vacillate between thinking it would being the coolest thing ever and being totally terrified at the prospect.Which way I'm leaning depends on the mos

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Vincent Lam's "The Headmaster's Wager"

Dr. Vincent Lam is from the expatriate Chinese community of Vietnam, and was born in Canada. Dr. Lam did his medical training in Toronto, and is an emergency physician in Toronto. He is a Lecturer with the Department of Family and Community Medicine at the University of Toronto. He has also worked in international air evacuation and expedition medicine on Arctic and Antarctic ships.Lam's first book, Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures, won the 2006 Scotiabank Giller Prize, and has recently been adapted for television and broadcast on HBO Canada. Dr. Lam co-authored The Flu Pandemic And You, a n

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Stephen Leather's "False Friends"

Stephen Leather was a journalist for more than ten years on newspapers such as the (London) Times, the Daily Mail, and the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong. He began writing full-time in 1992. His bestsellers have been translated into more than ten languages.Here Leather shares a suggestion for casting the lead in an adaptation of False Friends, the ninth book in the bestselling Dan "Spider" Shepherd series:The actor I’d most like to play my hero Dan “Spider” Shepherd is Clive Owen, star of Sin City, Children of Men and Killer Elite. He’s brilliant and looks fit enough to have been a sp

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Cyn Balog's "Touched"

Cyn Balog is the author of the young adult paranormal novels Fairy Tale, Sleepless, Starstruck, Touched, and Dead River. She lives outside Allentown, Pennsylvania with her husband and daughters.Here she shares some suggestions for casting the leads in an adaptation of Touched:I know of authors who cut out pictures of famous actors and actresses so they can better understand what their characters look like. I'm not one of those people, as I've slowly come to learn that readers care less about the color of one's hair and eyes than what makes a character tick. In selecting characters for my movi

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Charity Shumway's "Ten Girls to Watch"

Charity Shumway received an MFA in Creative Writing from Oregon State University and a BA in English from Harvard University. After graduate school, she spent nine months reporting on the 50th anniversary of Glamour’s "Top Ten College Women" contest. Her writing has appeared in Glamour, Ladies Home Journal, Fitness, and Garden Design, and her short fiction has been honored by Glimmer Train and Slice magazine, among others. She lives with her husband in Brooklyn, New York.Here Shumway dreamcasts an adaptation of her new, debut novel, Ten Girls to Watch: Long before Ten Girls to Watch was a boo

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Padgett Powell's "You & Me"

In Padgett Powell's You & Me "two loquacious gents on a porch discuss all manner of subjects, from the mundane to the spiritual to the downright ridiculous."Gary Shteyngart, bestselling author of Absurdistan and Super Sad True Love Story, claims that "You & Me, mixed with 750 ml of fine bourbon, is the most fun you can have in many states without getting arrested.”Here Powell shares some suggestions for the above-the-line talent should the novel be adapted for the big screen:I feel fairly sure that I want my book to be done by unknown actors, of whom there are so many who are so good.

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Tabish Khair's "The Thing About Thugs"

Tabish Khair is an award-winning poet, journalist, critic, educator and novelist. A citizen of India, he lives in Denmark and teaches literature at Aarhus University.Here he shares some ideas about casting a big screen adaptation of his novel, The Thing about Thugs:The Thing About Thugs is a novel about how we construct our identities and see others, wrapped in the colours of a crime mystery located in early Victorian London. It sets out, however, to narrate the crime from the perspectives of the underclass of London – tinkers, gypsies, Indian ayahs, Asian sailors, ex-slaves. As such, it d

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Suzanne Desrochers's "Bride of New France"

Suzanne Desrochers grew up in the French-Canadian village of Lafontaine on the shores of Georgian Bay, Ontario. Now based in Toronto, she is currently writing a Ph.D. thesis at King's College, London, comparing the migration of French and British women to North America in the early modern period. She has lived in Paris and Tokyo and traveled extensively throughout Asia. Her travel writing has appeared in Toronto's Now Magazine, and she has presented her history papers at academic conferences and seminars.Here Desrochers dreamcasts an adaptation of Bride of New France, her first novel:Bride of

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Tracey Garvis Graves's "On the Island"

Tracey Garvis Graves lives in a suburb of Des Moines, Iowa, with her husband, two children, and hyper dog Chloe.In On the Island, her first novel, two people stranded on an island struggle to survive—and slowly fall in love. Here the author shares some ideas for casting an adaptation of the story:Upon hearing the news that MGM has optioned On the Island for a feature film, the first thing people often ask me is, “Do you get to help cast the movie?” Sadly, the answer is no. But that doesn’t mean I can’t have a little fun thinking about who would play my characters (and I want to be ready if fo

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Stephen Miller's "The Messenger"

North Carolina born and raised, Stephen Miller is an actor on stage, film, and television as well as the author of plays, screenplays, and novels. Unforgettable moments in his acting career include swimming with Hume Cronyn, improvising for a day with Robert De Niro, carrying Bette Davis down a flight of concrete stairs, stunt-driving with Burt Reynolds, and delivering Laura Dern’s child, as well as three appearances on The X-Files.Here he dreamcasts an adaptation of his latest novel, The Messenger:Without spoiling anything, all through the action of The Messenger, Daria, the protagonist, thi

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David Cristofano's "The Exceptions"

David Cristofano has earned degrees in Government & Politics and Computer Science from the University of Maryland at College Park and has worked for different branches of the Federal Government for over a decade. He currently works in the Washington, D.C. area where he lives with his wife, son and daughter.Here Cristofano shares some ideas for cast and director of an adaptation of his new novel, The Exceptions:The movie rights to my first novel, The Girl She Used to Be, a story about a woman lost in the Federal Witness Protection Program, were sold to Mark Johnson's Gran Via Productions

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Joanna Campbell Slan's "Death of a Schoolgirl"

Joanna Campbell Slan’s first novel—Paper, Scissors, Death—was an Agatha Award finalist. It features Kiki Lowenstein, a spunky single mom who lives in St. Louis The sixth book in that series will be released Summer 2013.Here she dreamcasts an adaptation of her latest book, Death of a Schoolgirl, the first novel in The Jane Eyre Chronicles, which features Charlotte Brontë’s classic heroine Jane Eyre as an amateur sleuth:If they make Death of a Schoolgirl into a film, I'd love for Keira Knightley to play the part of Jane Eyre. I realize that most people would think Keira is too stunning

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F. J. Lennon's "Devil’s Gate"

F.J. Lennon is a Los-Angeles based writer of supernatural. His novels Soul Trapper and Devil’s Gate are the first two installments in a series that follows the turbulent life and times of rogue ghost hunter, Kane Pryce. Here he dreamcasts Devil’s Gate—part ghost story, part murder mystery, part rock and roll fable. Protagonist Kane Pryce must discover why Pasadena’s Colorado Street Bridge, also known as Suicide Bridge, is haunted and what keeps tortured souls trapped there.OK, let’s start at the top of the pyramid—Kane Pryce. A twenty-eight-year-old hard drinking, hard living, misanthropic

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Laurie Frankel's "Goodbye for Now"

Laurie Frankel was recently named one of ten women to watch in 2012. She is a proud core member of the Seattle7Writers. Her first novel, The Atlas of Love, came out in August 2010.Here Frankel shares some casting ideas for an adaptation of her new novel, Goodbye for Now:In fact, fabulously, Lionsgate has bought the film option for Goodbye For Now. Exciting, no? So they’re in charge. This is great news for many reasons, not the least of which is that casting a movie is a great mystery to me. Choosing real live actors to play characters who until recently existed only in my head seems completel

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Carolyn Wall's "Playing With Matches"

Carolyn Wall is the author of the internationally acclaimed novel Sweeping Up Glass as well as the recently released Playing With Matches.Here she dreamcasts an adaptation of the new novel:I’m overjoyed with reactions to my second novel, Playing With Matches. It was fun to write and, in need of a setting, I did what fiction often writers do – I chose a town in one state and moved it to another. Thus, a chunk of Texas is now in Mississippi. I love the Gulf coast and have witnessed what hurricanes can do – even when they travel upriver. None of those things were hard to write. Neither were

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Matthew Parker's "Larceny in My Blood"

Matthew Parker recently earned an MFA in creative writing from Columbia University and has been drug- and crime-free since 2002. Born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, he now lives in New York City.Here he shares a suggestion for the lead in a big screen adaptation of his new book, Larceny in My Blood: A Memoir of Heroin, Handcuffs, and Higher Education:There are a several reasons why I’d choose Sean Penn to play me in a film of my book.First off is we are close in age, both of us being born in 1960. Penn is also, like myself, a natural-born iconoclast, and often portrays such characters in film;

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Shon Hopwood's "Law Man"

Shon Hopwood is a law school student at the University of Washington School of Law who, prior to law school, served over ten years in federal prison for a string of bank robberies he committed as a young adult. While in prison, he learned the law and he wrote legal briefs for other prisoners, two of which were granted by the U.S. Supreme Court—the equivalent of winning the legal lottery. Law Man: My Story of Robbing Banks, Winning Supreme Court Cases, and Finding Redemption is the story of his prison term, legal successes, and the romance of his now wife while he was still incarcerated.Here h

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Margaret Dilloway's "The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns"

Margaret Dilloway was inspired by her Japanese mother's experiences when she wrote The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns, and especially by a book her father had given to her mother called The American Way of Housekeeping.Here the author shares some suggestions for casting a big screen adaptation of The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns:I didn’t have any specific actors in mind as I was writing The Care and Handling of Roses with Thorns except for two (which you will read about below), but when I see certain actors they conjure my characters. It’s shaping up to be an extraordinary (

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Daniel H. Wilson's "Amped"

Daniel H. Wilson earned a Ph.D. in robotics from Carnegie Mellon University. His books include How to Survive a Robot Uprising, Where’s My Jetpack?, How to Build a Robot Army, The Mad Scientist Hall of Fame, Bro-Jitsu: The Martial Art of Sibling Smackdown, A Boy and His Bot, and Robopocalypse.Here he dreamcasts an adaptation of his new novel, Amped:Amped is a techno-thriller about a guy living through a civil rights movement that is sparked when people with disabilities start using neural implants that make them smarter and faster than average people. The protagonist, Owen Gray, starts out as

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