50 YA Books We Want Adapted to the Big or Small Screen

Cover to The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan. Image via Gollancz Books.

33. The Forest of Hands and Teeth

Zombies dominate basic cable television right now, even when The Walking Dead has seen some controversy in the first half of its seventh season. On the big screen, though, not much more than World War Z has really managed to make an impact, and though it supposedly has a sequel, that sequel seems to be in some sort of limbo.

Also, look, sometimes what you need is a teenaged heroine instead of Brad Pitt. Sorry, Mr. Pitt, but it’s true.

That’s why we’d like to put forward something like The Forest of Hands and Teeth from Carrie Ryan. Unfortunately, it isn’t a true franchise so much as a series of connected novels, with the sequel a bit more distant than most sequels, and the third book dealing with another character. The first novel, though, sees Mary trying to escape the Sisterhood and reach the ocean.

However, it’s also zombies in a post-apocalyptic world in which new orders have been set up instead of dealing with the initial outbreak. Not that we don’t love The Walking Dead, but we’d love to see something a bit different. (Suffice it to say that if Mira Grant’s Feed series were YA, it would be on this list faster than you can say “Zombies are so hot right now”.)