Be on the lookout for Kirkus’ in-depth columns on The Long Walk, a theatrical film based on an early dystopian horror novel by Stephen King (premiering September 12), and The Man in My Basement, a Hulu film based on the 2004 suspense novel by Walter Mosley and starring Corey Hawkins and Willem Dafoe (premiering on the streaming service on September 26). Here are four more book-to-screen adaptations coming soon:

September 5: Highest 2 Lowest (film premiere, Apple TV+)

Ed McBain’s 1959 police procedural, King’s Ransom, was loosely adapted once before as the 1963 film High and Low, co-written and directed by Japanese auteur Akira Kurosawa. Now, director Spike Lee presents Highest 2 Lowest, starring Denzel Washington, who’s starred in several of Lee’s films, including the 2006 thriller Inside Man. McBain’s novel centers on Douglas King, who must choose between executing an ambitious, expensive plan to take over the shoe company where he works or paying a ransom to save his chauffeur’s son, who has been kidnapped by mistake (King’s own son was the intended target). In Lee’s film, New York City–based music mogul David King (Washington) faces a similar moral dilemma when someone abducts the son of his driver and longtime friend (American Fiction’s Jeffrey Wright). King can pay the multimillion-dollar ransom—but then he’ll lose control of the record label that he spent his life building. It’s an engaging setup with an intriguing cast that includes rappers A$AP Rocky and Ice Spice, Oz’s Dean Winters, and The Wire’s Wendell Pierce.

September 5: Preparation for the Next Life (theatrical film premiere)

Atticus Lish’s 2014 novel, which won the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, is similarly set in New York City, where Zou Lei, an undocumented Chinese Uyghur immigrant, and Brad Skinner, an American war veteran with PTSD, are both struggling to get by. When the two meet by chance, there’s an immediate spark; from that point on, as Kirkus’ review put it, “they negotiate the streets of a tough city in an even tougher country that, perhaps, doesn’t care about them at all.” This promising movie adaptation, directed by Oscar-nominated documentary filmmaker Bing Liu (Minding the Gap), stars Sebiye Behtiyar in her first feature, alongside Fred Hechinger, who was excellent in a supporting role in Fear Street Part One: 1994, one of our favorite adaptations of 2021.

September 12: The History of Sound (theatrical film premiere)

Paul Mescal (Normal People) and Josh O’Connor (Challengers) co-star in this film version of the title story from Ben Shattuck’s 2024 Kirkus-starred collection. In that story, Lionel Worthing, a 72-year-old choir singer and folk-music scholar, recalls his brief romance with David Ashton, whom he met when they were both teenagers attending the New England Conservatory. The core of his recollection centers on two months they spent in 1919 traveling around rural Maine and recording songs on wax cylinders for a project that, according to David, the Bowdoin University music department had assigned him. Lionel reflects on how his idyll, and its aftermath, changed his life. It’s a wistful, affecting story, and its movie adaptation, written by Shattuck and directed by Oliver Hermanus (Living), was nominated for the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year.

September 19: The Summer Book (theatrical film premiere)

Finnish author Tove Jansson, who died in 2001, is best known for writing and illustrating numerous children’s books about a group of trolls known as the Moomins and their adventures in the fictional Moominvalley. However, she also wrote several literary novels and short stories for adults, including 1972’s The Summer Book—a series of vignettes about a 10-year-old girl, Sophia, whose mother has recently died, and her 85-year-old grandmother as they explore an island in the Gulf of Finland over a summer. Our review praised the work’s “spindrift perceptions,” calling them “fresh and penetrating.” This English-language film adaptation, directed by Charlie McDowell (Windfall) stars the great Glenn Close as the grandmother and newcomer Emily Matthews as Sophia. The trailer shows off the film’s lush visuals, which stand in for Jansson’s lovely, occasional pen-and-ink drawings in the original text.

David Rapp is the senior Indie editor.