This is sort of two lists in one. It is not only a list of books that I think would make great TV shows, but also includes books that should have been made into TV shows instead of movies. I have recently gotten into Outlander, and have been watching The Vampire Diaries, Game of Thrones and several others, so I started to think about what other books I have read that would make good television series.

1. Bloodsucking Fiends by Christopher Moore
A little twisted and very funny, this first book, along with his sequels You Suck and Bite Me, is a vampire love story. New vampire Jody is trying to find her way in San Francisco, and figure out who turned her, and she finds help in the form of a writer turned Safeway night-clerk named Tommy.

2. Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling
I really enjoyed the movies, but there were so many minor stories from the books that were left out and so many character backstories still inside Rowling’s head that are slowly making their way onto her Pottermore website. Seriously though, where did Charlie Weasley go?!

3. What I Had Before I Had You by Sarah Cornwell*
This is a really great novel about a woman who has bipolar disorder. You see how she is dealing with her recent divorce and her son’s newly developed symptoms, as well as flashbacks of when she was a teenager and was starting to exhibit signs. While shows like Homeland and Shameless often depict the extreme symptoms, this gives a more authentic look at the realities of multi-generational manifestations of the disorder.

4. Divine Secrets of the Ya-ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells
This book, as well as Little Altars Everywhere, were two of my favorite books in high school…and, oh my God, I am just *now* discovering that a third book came out in 2006 that I did not even know about called Ya-yas in Bloom! My group of girlfriends and I even called ourselves the Ya-yas, and I was obviously TV Yaya. There were so many great stories about this group of four girlfriends, from childhood to adulthood, that would be awesome to see come to life in a series.

5. The Office of Mercy by Ariel Djanikian*
In the same vein as The Hunger Games and Divergent, this book is set in a dystopian future and features a young girl who questions her government’s actions and goes about trying to change things. Only one book has been written (I am not sure if more are coming), but it opened up a whole world of potential stories about America Five and the people that live there.

6. His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman
To be fair, I have never actually seen the movie version of The Golden Compass, mostly because it got really bad reviews. However, the books are fantastic. After seeing what HBO did with Game of Thrones, I think the story of Lyra Belacqua and the fantasy world that she inhabits could be amazing on the small screen. Forget direwolves, I want a talking, warrior polar bear!

7. The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach
This book follows the beautifully intertwined stories of baseball players Henry Skrimshander, Owen Dunne and Mike Schwartz, as well as their college president Guert Affenlight, and his daughter Pella. Their lives intersect in such a unique way and the relationships are really intriguing. Also, I just really want a show about baseball. There is a pretty definite ending to this book, so it might work better as a mini-series.

8. The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien
Like with Harry Potter, there was so much more to this world that Tolkien created that was never included in any of the movies (I also could have done with less orcs). If you even go back all the way and start with the Silmarillion, there is so much story left to explore.

*I attended high school with both Cornwell and Djanikian