I meant in that it uses characters created by someone else.
Ah, gotcha!
I thought
Death Comes to Pemberley
and
The Magicians
were not very good. There's
Perks of Being a Wallflower,
heavily influenced by
Catcher,
but I think the writing in that is abysmal. I seem to be in the minority for really not getting why it's become such a teen classic. Let me ponder other possibilities...
ETA:
I ADORE the Mary Russell books, though the first three were better than any of the rest.
The Jane Austen Book Club. You could probably do a whole salon on works that reference Austen heavily.
I feel like there are several that I just can't quite remember. This is going to drive me nuts.
Yeah, I just remembered the
Mister Pip
one seeing it in my notes and I remember loving the idea when I heard about it. I'm sure there are probably a bunch.
Oh, what about
A Thousand Acres,
a great book winning tons of awards and based on
King Lear?
Found an interesting link: [link]
The Jane Austen Book Club.
Oooh, that's a great example (although I didn't like that particular book).
And I know one person in the salon who would probably love the Mary Russell books (which I've been meaning to try myself).
I love Atwood's
Penelopiad,
but that's in part because I've taught the original
Odyssey
so many times that I get all of her references and find them endlessly entertaining.
There's probably a whole other pile based on The Iliad, The Odyssey, and The Aenead. And retellings of Medea.
Found an interesting link: [link]
Thanks! Lots of good ideas there. Bridget Jones Diary is perhaps stretching it a bit, but a few of those seem exactly the type of thing I'm looking for.