Rosamund Pike

Gone Girl Found: Tom Cruise’s girl is now Ben Affleck’s Gone Girl. Rosamund Pike, the 34-year-old British actress, has been signed on to play Amy Elliott, the eponymous “Girl” of Gillian Flynn’s smash hit thriller novel Gone Girl.

Ben Affleck will play Amy’s husband Nick. Written in his and her alternating chapters, Gone Girl is the gripping story of a woman who goes missing on her fifth wedding anniversary with her husband being the prime suspect. Published in July 2012, Gone Girl has been on The New York Times bestseller list for 62 straight weeks.

The film will be directed by David Fincher, who has vast experience in adapting from page to screen, be it The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The Social Network or The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

Though relatively unknown compared with the actresses she beat to the role of Amy — Charlize Theron, Natalie Portman and Emily Blunt — Pike was in fact last seen in a book adaptation, Jack Reacher, opposite Tom Cruise.

While Bookworm is delighted with the choice of Affleck as Nick, she’d like to hold her own counsel on Pike. What she’s really dying to know is what role Neil Patrick Harris and Tyler Perry have landed. NPH has to be Amy’s rich ex, but Perry...?! The film is set to release in 2015.

SPACE WARS ANEW: Good news for fans of space operas and epic fantasies. American comic book and TV writer Brian K. Vaughan has mixed the two genres to come up with Saga [Image Comics, Rs 522 and Rs 632], a two-volume comic book series. An inter-galactic love story of two inhabitants from two warring planets, Saga blends science fiction, fantasy and romance. While Alana is from planet Landfall Coalition, Marko hails from its natural satellite, Wreath. The war was fought on different planets across the galaxy to avoid mutual annihilation. But despite peace being restored between the two home worlds, warring factions in all the other planets continue to fight. The protagonists are on the run from groups desperate to hunt them down, thus setting up an interesting inter-galactic adventure.

Influenced by space operas like Star Wars and Flash Gordon, Vaughan conceptualised Saga in his childhood. The series is also influenced by The Lord of the Rings and the more recent A Song of Ice and Fire (aka Game of Thrones). The artwork by Fiona Staples looks traditional comic book and portrays the planetary set pieces as larger than life, lending the story an epic look and feel.

SHOPPING SPREE: While Calcuttans are on their annual Puja shopping frenzy, Bookworm is almost done, thanks to Starmark’s Giant Sale and Oxford Bookstore’s Great Monsoon Sale.

With discounts running up to 50 per cent at Starmark and 80 per cent at Oxford, it’s a good time to complete your Agatha Christie collection, start your kids off on their own classics library or pick up some “cerebral” Puja and Diwali gifts. At Starmark, the sale is on till September 15, with discounts on popular authors, romances, coffee-table books and special offers on Tintin and Asterix comics. At Oxford Bookstore the sale is on till August 31.

NEW FORSYTH LIST: The godfather of political thrillers is back! Frederick Forsyth, the man behind bestsellers like The Day of the Jackal and The Odessa File, will publish The Kill List [Putnam Adult, Rs 299] on August 28. It chronicles the covert operations of TOSA or Technical Operations Support Activity, a fictional organisation that hunts down people who pose a threat to the United States. When the father of one of TOSA’s top hunting men is killed by a terrorist outfit nicknamed Preacher, the battle takes a personal turn.

Forsyth gained prominence in 1971 with The Day of the Jackal, a thriller about a professional assassin sent to take down the French president. Noted for its realism, the novel has often been mistaken for non-fiction. He went on to write over 15 thrillers, many of them spawning high-octane movies.

Bookworm says, read up The Kill List fast for Snow White & The Huntsman maker Rupert Sanders has already been signed on to direct the movie adaptation.

TICKET TO HONG KONG: First Chetan Bhagat extolled the virtues of arranged marriage. Now, Durjoy Datta is extolling the virtues of a holiday in Hong Kong. The Hong Kong tourism board has tied up with the 26-year-old, thanks to his latest novel Hold My Hand [Penguin India, Rs 140], which is set largely in HK.

The July release revolves around Deep, a book nerd, who lands a “dream internship” in Hong Kong. There he falls in love with a beautiful girl, Ahana. But he must come to terms with Ahana’s congenital problem that has robbed her of eyesight. When love blooms, what better way than to hold each other’s hand and get to know the city?

The Hong Kong tourism board has stepped in for a joint promotion of the book as well as tourism in Hong Kong. On offer is an HKTB Hold My Hand tourist package, an HKTB tie-up with coffee chain Barista Lavazza for a Hold My Hand coffee (though Shobhaa De got there first with her Sethji coffee), and a chance for budding filmmakers to make a short film based on the novel.

If filmstars can peddle everything from ceiling fans to fairness creams, why not writers, wonders Bookworm.

Stephen Fry as Jeeves and Hugh Laurie as Bertie Wooster in the TV series Jeeves and Wooster

BY JEEVES! Hold on to your sides, or they might split. The how-larious pair of Bertie Wooster and Jeeves will soon be back in a new avatar. It’s been 39 years since PG Wodehouse penned his last (Aunts Aren’t Gentlemen), and given the continuing popularity of the 15 books of short stories and novels, The Wodehouse Estate has allowed a new writer to bring the iconic characters back on the shelves. But where can one find another Wodehouse?

The search ended with British author of Birdsong and A Week in December, Sebastian Faulks, who has agreed to take on the rather arduous task. Faulks has already done the same with Agent 007, writing the bestselling Devil May Care in 2008, which is also Hollywood’s next James Bond adaptation. However, fans have raised concerns over Faulks’s Dickensian novels and the serious undertones in his work.

Titled Jeeves and the Wedding Bells, the new novel will be published by Random House and released on November 6. India might have to wait till next year, though.

Till then, Bookworm plans to settle down with a drink and reruns of the Jeeves and Wooster television series, starring Stephen Fry as Jeeves and Hugh Laurie as Bertie Wooster.

If the TV series were to be remade today, who would you cast as Bertie and Jeeves? Tell t2@abp.in