7 Worthy SF/F Books Eclipsed By Their Film Adaptations

The Body Snatchers, by Jack Finney
For a novel that has been adapted for the screen four times, Finney’s The Body Snatchers remains surprisingly obscure to modern audiences. In fact, younger viewers may be surprised to learn there was a source novel at all, and the basic premise of alien seed pods that replace humans with duplicates, spinning up a maelstrom of paranoia and doom, is so embedded in the popular culture it seems like it must have been a collective idea instead of an individual one.

The Postman, by David Brin
Today most people know this as the title of an infamous 1997 film, the second of Kevin Costner’s massive sci-fi box office misfires (the more infamous being Waterworld, which had the decency to not drag a good novel down with it)—and it was a bomb, earning $18 million against an $80 million budget. Before Costner’s ego got hold of it, The Postman was a pretty great sci fi novel that sought to be the anti-Mad Max, depicting a post-apocalyptic world where community and old-school patriotism—and a mysterious drifter who puts on a postal uniform and starts a rumor that the United States Federal Government is reforming—eventually brings hope back to the people. Today Brin’s novel is obscured by the lurid story of a Hollywood fiasco, but it remains a refreshingly optimistic and clever after-the-end tale.

Planet of the Apes, by Pierre Boulle
When a film has a moment as iconic and pop-culturally dominant as the ending of the 1968 film that sees Charlton Heston on his knees in front of the ruined Statue of Liberty, it’s no wonder so many people have never read, or perhaps heard of, the 1963 source novel La Planète des Singes—and the fact that the original book is in French isn’t helping. For fans of the films, the book is worth checking out, if only because the story is drastically different from what plays out onscreen.

Who Goes There, by John W. Campbell, Jr.
Another novel that’s been adapted no fewer than four times (under the titles The Thing from Another World, Horror Express, and The Thing—twice!), Campbell’s 1938 work remains fresh and modern to this day. Its strength is demonstrated by the fidelity of the adaptations to the original story of an alien, discovered frozen in the Antarctic ice by isolated scientists, that can take on the form and memories of any creature it consumes. A masterpiece of paranoia and horror, it will still curl you toes even if you’ve seen every film version.

Battlefield Earth, by L. Ron Hubbard
If you’re only familiar with the 2000 film starring John Travolta, you’re not alone, but aside from founding the Church of Scientology, L. Ron Hubbard was also a legitimate (if dubiously talented) SF writer in the 1940s and 1950s. Billed as his return to sci fi, Battlefield Earth the novel is just as pulpy as the film version, but it has an unbridled sense of fun that makes it a significantly more entertaining experience. It tells the tale of a future earth conquered by the Psychlos, giant, hairy, sadistic beings who have nearly wiped out humanity and are stripping the world of its minerals. Weird details include intergalactic bankers who threaten to repossess the Earth and a conquering alien race that doesn’t bother to learn a single human language. Despite the infamy of its author, the book is worth remembering, yet today most only recall the title as one of the most infamous film bombs ever.

Make Room! Make Room!, by Harry Harrison
The 1973 film adaptation of Harrison’s 1966 novel, Soylent Green, remains a powerful part of the zeitgeist more than four decades later, with the title still a codeword for cannibalism and future food science. Which is interesting, because there’s no cannibalism in the original novel, in which “Soylent” stands for steaks made from soybeans and lentils. The novel concentrates on the increasingly crowded, rationed world after decades of unchecked population growth, and is one of the rare examples of a film adaptation that might have better twists than the source material. This is also the second time Charlton Heston has single-handedly buried a novel.

Logan’s Run, by William F. Nolan and George Clayton Johnson
Almost no one realizes that the very, very 1970s film Logan’s Run, starring the very, very 1970s Michael York, is based on a novel of the same name—in fact, you may be hard-pressed to think of a more thoroughly forgotten novel. With a plot similar to the film, the book is actually very, very 1960s, examining the dominance of youth and Youth Culture through the lens of the rising Hippie movement, taken to typically doomsday SF extremes. Rumors of a sequel titled Jessica’s Run continue to float around every now and then (as has talk of a big budget remake of the film, come to think of it), but so far, nothing has emerged.
Any other forgotten SF novels that films buried?