Retellings based on other literary classics

[igenlode]

A possibly useful list for 'comps' in a book pitch?
https://www.goodreads.com/blog/show/2959-twice-told-tales-192-top-retellings-that-readers-love

"James" by Percival Everett (Huckleberry Finn)
"Demon Copperhead" by Barbara Kingsolver (David Copperfield)
"The Sisters K" by Maureen Sun (The Brothers Karamazov)
"The Great Mann" by Kyra Davis Lurie (The Great Gatsby)
"Revenge" by Stephen Fry (The Count of Monte Cristo -- why have I not heard about this?)
"Countess" by Suzan Palumbo (The Count of Monte Cristo)
"What Moves the Dead" by T.Kingfisher (The Fall of the House of Usher)
"Beautiful Little Fools" by Jillian Cantor (The Great Gatsby)
"The Prince" by Dinitia Smith (The Golden Bowl)
"Quichotte" by Salman Rushdie (guess...)
"The Chosen and the Beautiful" by Nghi Vo (The Great Gatsby)
"The Wife Upstairs" by Rachel Hawkins (Jane Eyre)
"For She is Wrath" by Emily Varga (The Count of Monte Cristo)
"The Daughter of Doctor Moreau" by Silvia Moreno-Garcia (The Island of Doctor Moreau)
"Heartless Hunter" by Kristen Ciccarelli (probably The Scarlet Pimpernel)
"A Botanical Daughter" by Noah Medlock (Frankenstein)
"Julia" by Sandra Newman (1984)
"Chicano Frankenstein" by Daniel A. Olivas (Frankenstein)
"Frankenstein in Baghdad" by Ahmed Saadawi (guess...)
"Scarlet" by Genevieve Cogman (The Scarlet Pimpernel)
"Paul takes the form of a mortal girl" by Andrea Lawlor (no idea; sounds awful)
"The Days of Afrekete" by Asali Solomon (Mrs Dalloway/Sula)
"Assembly" by Natasha Brown (no idea)
"The Weight of Blood" by Tiffany D. Jackson (Carrie is it even legal to fanfic that?)
"Not Good for Maidens" by Tori Bovalino (Goblin Market)
"Wicked" by Gregory Maguire ("The Wizard of Oz" this is a seriously old one, no good for 'comps')
"On Beauty" by Zadie Smith (Howards End)
"Wild and Distant Seas" by Tara Kerr Roberts (Moby Dick -- just about...)
"Queen Bee" by Amalie Howard (The Count of Monte Cristo as chick-lit)
"Thunderhead" by Miranda Darling (Mrs Dalloway)
"March" by Geraldine Brooks (Little Women)
"Hungerstone" by Kat Dunn (Carmilla)
"A Dowry of Blood" by S.T.Gibson (Dracula)
"The Other March Sisters" by Linda Epstein (Little Women)
"Say Hello to My Little Friend" by Jennine Capó Crucet (Scarface the movie)
"Lucy Undying" by Kiersten White (Dracula)
"The Family Chao" by Lan Samantha Chang (The Brothers Karamazov)
"Make Me a Monster" by Kalynn Bayron (Frankenstein)
"Fagin the Thief" by Allison Epstein (Oliver Twist)
"House of Beth" by Kerry Cullen (Rebecca)
"Salvacion" by Sandra Proudman (Zorro)
"The Ballad of Black Tom" by Victor LaValle (Lovecraft: The Horror at Red Hook")
"Three Parties" by Ziyad Saadi (Mrs Dalloway)

---

Well, that was a depressing list to slog through. Apparently you need to take a source novel and rewrite it from a feminist/immigrant/queer/YA perspective (bonus points for hitting as many of the above of possible simultaneously). I could tell just from reading the blurbs, never mind the reviews, that I had absolutely no desire to read almost any of the titles mentioned, and presumably none of those authors/publishers/readers have any desire to read the sort of thing I write...

Most popular source novels: Frankenstein, Mrs Dalloway, The Count of Monte Cristo (surprisingly), and The Great Gatsby. Dracula, Little Women and The Brothers Karamazov also got two entries each.

Comments

[pedanther]

Revenge is another old one: it came out about 25 years ago. The original title is The Stars' Tennis Balls; "Revenge" is what it got changed to in the US editions.

I don't think I understand what's depressing about this list. Retelling old stories in new contexts is a fundamental human activity that's been going on for millennia, and it's not like people have stopped telling new stories as well. 192 books is a drop in the ocean.

[igenlode]

Ah, that explains why the top (Russian) reviewer refers to the Stephen Fry book as "Tennis Balls of Heaven" -- I had assumed that was simply a particularly creative approach on the publisher/translator's part :-D

And if it's twenty years old that also explains why I hadn't heard of its existence alongside Fry's other books; I didn't actively check the publication dates on any of these, having no time to do more than very rapidly skim the Goodreads display on each to establish the original work if possible, so it may be that many of them are far too old to be any use as 'comps' in the first place. Agents want you to be able to list comparable recent books in the same genre to prove that there is likely to be a potential market for your own manuscript, where 'recent' is limited to two or three years...

Which is why the general impression that I got of this selection is depressing from my point of view, I'm afraid. If what it takes to get into print is to be seen debunking and subverting existing well-known novels, then the possibility of getting my 'Arctic Raoul' accepted as a valid piece of homage to the original (i.e. published fanfic) becomes even lower, given that I was attempting to faithfully reproduce the worldview of the canon characters rather than critique its ideology :-(