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A review by regnarenol
Interstellar: The Official Movie Novelization by Greg Keyes
4.0
I blazed through this book in a way I no longer seem to be able to, so it can't be terrible, right? It's not.
I don't think I have read any movie novelizations in my life, so I didn't know what to expect when I picked this one up. All the questions I had concerned how badly it would (because it surely would) botch up a much loved film. Would they change plot points? Dialogues? How would the pacing of the book be?
The answer, at least when it comes to this novelization, is that everything's remarkably faithful to the original. I could only pick out a handful of dialogues that were different from the film, but the rest of the book is merely dedicated to poring over the thoughts of Cooper, Brand or whosever point of view was currently being explored, but mostly Cooper.
The flipside of this faithfulness is that if you're looking to read the book with a view to understand some unresolved plot points from the film, you'll be disappointed, because this book doesn't touch anything the film doesn't.
Alright, so how's the pacing? Pretty darn good! Not Matthew Reilly quick, but there's very little philosophizing and adequate description.
My perspective, of course, is of somebody who's watched the film first (thrice!) and loved it, so I have no qualms at all about the story. I'm not sure how it'd be like for somebody who's reading this book first. I enjoyed the nostalgic walkthrough that this book turned out to be!
A weakness with this book is however the quality of writing - there were a number of occasions when I felt the author didn't quite have the literary chops of some of the top writers today, but with the story and dialogues he's been supplied with, and the pacing he's set for the tale, you aren't too inconvenienced.
I don't think I have read any movie novelizations in my life, so I didn't know what to expect when I picked this one up. All the questions I had concerned how badly it would (because it surely would) botch up a much loved film. Would they change plot points? Dialogues? How would the pacing of the book be?
The answer, at least when it comes to this novelization, is that everything's remarkably faithful to the original. I could only pick out a handful of dialogues that were different from the film, but the rest of the book is merely dedicated to poring over the thoughts of Cooper, Brand or whosever point of view was currently being explored, but mostly Cooper.
The flipside of this faithfulness is that if you're looking to read the book with a view to understand some unresolved plot points from the film, you'll be disappointed, because this book doesn't touch anything the film doesn't.
Alright, so how's the pacing? Pretty darn good! Not Matthew Reilly quick, but there's very little philosophizing and adequate description.
My perspective, of course, is of somebody who's watched the film first (thrice!) and loved it, so I have no qualms at all about the story. I'm not sure how it'd be like for somebody who's reading this book first. I enjoyed the nostalgic walkthrough that this book turned out to be!
A weakness with this book is however the quality of writing - there were a number of occasions when I felt the author didn't quite have the literary chops of some of the top writers today, but with the story and dialogues he's been supplied with, and the pacing he's set for the tale, you aren't too inconvenienced.