Movie Monday: Books Coming to the Big Screen in 2016

Rejoice, book lovers! The trend of transforming books into movies continues to ramp up in 2016, with everything from classics to YA novels to recent best-sellers being adapted for the Big Screen.

Here is BuzzFeed's List of 19 Books to Read Before the Movie Comes Out in 2016. Goodreads has its own list, with over 100 books being made into movies (but notice the caveat at the top of the page - the list was made by Goodreads' users, so not all of those listed will actually be released in 2016).

Of the list of 19 movies listed at Buzzfeed, I have read three of the books:

• Allegiant by Veronica Roth (#3 in the Divergent series) - my favorite of the trilogy
• The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins, which my husband & I both read last summer
• Bill Lynn's Long Halftime Walk by Ben Fountain, an amazing & powerful novel

All of these will make good movies. I know my husband and I will enjoy seeing the first two together. But the one I am most looking forward to is Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk because it was such an incredible, moving, funny book. It was a finalist for the National Book Award, and I can't wait to see how they adapt it for film - it will have to be really good to meet the standards of the book.

The 5th Wave is one we have here at home, but none of the three of us have read it yet! It just came out in the theaters, so we better get busy.

From the Goodreads list, Ready Player One by Ernest Cline (my favorite book read on 2012) and Looking for Alaska by John Green are favorite books of mine, and both will make great movies...but the latest updates show they won't be released until 2017. Similarly, my husband and I both LOVED Wool by Hugh Howey and can't wait to see that on film, but it is still only in the very earliest stages of development. Same with Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer, an outstanding middle-grade series. American Pastoral by Philip Roth, however, is due out in 2016 and should be good (probably more to my liking than my husband's, though!).

11/22/63 by Stephen King is another favorite of ours, but it has been made into a TV mini-series that will be airing soon on Hulu (we must find a friend with a Hulu subscription!) The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay is also slated for the small screen but is still in early stages of development. I'd love to see that one, too - it's such an epic novel that it will make a wonderful TV series.

Wow, so many great movies and TV series to look forward to for us book lovers!

Which movie adaptations are you most looking forward to in 2016?