You probably already know that Jennifer Egan won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction for A Visit from the Goon Squad, her quirky novel described in BookPage as “a series of pastiches that deftly and lyrically illustrates the ways people and culture change, yet stay remarkably the same.”
But did you know that Egan’s award-winning novel is set to become a series from HBO? Deadline has the scoop:
Egan has closed a deal with HBO to turn her sprawling tale into a TV series. Groundswell’s Michael London will be executive producer and Jocelyn Hays Simpson will be co-exec producer. Egan will be a consultant. The network hasn’t yet set a writer to draft the series pilot, but it will happen quickly . . .
I have not read A Visit from the Goon Squad, so I can’t comment on whether the novel is a natural for TV. What I can say is that when I’ve asked friends in recent months what contemporary fiction they’ve read and enjoyed—more than a couple have raved about A Visit from the Goon Squad. Needless to say, this book has moved up on my TBR.
(Side note: A Visit from the Goon Squad came out in paperback on March 22, and it’s one of our top picks for book clubs in the April issue of BookPage.)
As far as other Pulitzer news, I admit that I was even more excited about the finalists for the fiction prize, because both novels are very special to me—two of my favorite reads of 2010, in fact.
The Surrendered by Chang-rae Lee and The Privileges by Jonathan Dee are the two finalists, and here’s what the Pulitzer website has to say:
A haunting and often heartbreaking epic whose characters explore the deep reverberations of love, devotion and war. (The Surrendered)
A contemporary, wide ranging tale about an elite Manhattan family, moral bankruptcy and the long reach of wealth. (The Privileges)
If you’d like to read a more impassioned (some might say long-winded) essay on these books, check out my blog posts from last fall. Here is why I LOVED The Surrendered, and voted for it to appear on BookPage’s Best Books of 2010 list. Here is why I could not shut up about The Privileges.
You can also read my interview with Chang-rae Lee and a review of The Privileges.
Were you pleased with the Pulitzer for fiction winner and finalists? Have you read A Visit from the Goon Squad, The Surrendered and/or The Privileges? Why did you love them (or not)?
