Tarantino wrote one for Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, although that was an intentional nostalgic throwback to the heyday of novelisations.

I remember as a kid I had a novelisation of Jurassic Park. Not the book that movie was based on, but a novelisation of the actual movie. I remember liking it quite a bit.

The Doctor Who novelisations are famously good, and for many fans of the original (Classic) run of the show, the novelisations are more memorable than the show itself. Any of the ones written by Terrence Dicks are especially good.

The novelisations of the Star Wars prequels are better than the movies, especially Revenge of the Sith. They take the great ideas George Lucas had in that trilogy and iron out the stilted execution.

They’re from an era when movies weren’t available on demand. It was harder to find a movie again after it left theatres, so novelisations filled the gap. They’re still around, but far less necessary than they used to be.

I find it difficult to care about that sort of thing. I’m aware that female authors, authors of colour, and queer authors (amongst other groups) have traditionally been held back by mainstream media and I think it’s a good thing to have them be able to get their voice out there, but I don’t like choosing books to read based on what the author represents (even if I support that representation). I think that would render me incapable of viewing the book on its own terms. I would be trying to understand where it fits in the history of African American women, for example. Books should be judged on their own terms.