Michael Connelly’s crime novels regularly top the best-seller lists. His Harry Bosch series has sold more than 2.6 million
copies. His website gets one million hits a
month, and his email list boasts about 30,000 names. Connelly is a certified celebrity in the mystery book world. You’d think studios would be scrambling to make movies based on his books. But so far, only BLOOD WORK has made it to the screen…and was a critical and box-office dud (but was something of a dry run for the creative team that would make MYSTIC RIVER an Oscar-winning success).
Although Connelly co-created the UPN TV series LEVEL 9, his involvement was minimal and the show tanked( a writer on the show, Paul Guyot, has a nice appreciation of Connelly on his blog today).
Over the years, his Bosch books have been optioned several times and countless screenplays have been written…and yet, no movie or even a TV pilot have been produced (having read a couple of those scripts, I can understand why). VOID MOON reportedly began as an original screenplay before Connelly turned it into a book…and yet, no movie there, either.
What’s the problem here? I don’t know. Perhaps it’s the same curse that has kept Thomas Perry’s books from being made into films. But now there’s buzz that Connelly’s new novel THE LINCOLN LAWYER is generating heat in Hollywood and is big-screen bound.
Let’s hope.