Book vs. Movie: The Perfect Find
When traveling from the page to the small screen is perfection
I have loved romance novels unapologetically since I was in fourth grade. I’m dating myself here, probably, but I think this is the result of growing up saturated with Harlequin covers featuring Fabio (whom the main character in The Witcher evokes for me, strangely) and obsessed with Judy Blume’s Forever, the way I felt when I was immersed in those books and couldn’t let them go: Like even if the main characters were white, and until Terry McMillan and Bebe Moore Campbell and even Zane came along, they really were, love was an obtainable fantasy. Just because I didn’t see myself represented in these stories didn’t mean that love wasn’t possible. I just thought maybe it wasn’t possible for Black women.
But then I read the Black women who were being published in the 1990s who broke open a door to romance for us. And even though they nurtured and expanded my idea of love and courtship, it wasn’t until I read Tia Williams’ Seven Days in June that I really truly saw myself represented — two writers with a past and their steamy reunion enraptured me from start to finish and I could not stop yammering about how dope the book was.
As much as I like to be a hype woman and booster for well-told Black stories, particularly those steeped in love and romance, I try not to be influenced by what others are reading or thinking about. I learned a long time ago that book clubs are a special kind of tiring for me. It’s not that I don’t love reading in community, it’s more that I like to make up my own mind about how a book works, to see the contours of what an author was thinking and constructing. I believe reading to be sacred, and as a girl raised Catholic, the interiority that is reflected by what we choose to focus on feels like it needs the sanctuary and distance of solitude.
This is a long way of saying that when Amazon suggested The Perfect Find to me, I was into it. It was by way of a post from a book club that I noticed the book was being adapted into a Netflix movie starring Gabrielle Union. The book is about a forty-year-old fashion journalist/icon named Jenna Jones, who after a very public split with her long-term partner, Brian, attempts to make a comeback working for her arch-nemesis, Darcy, who runs a more relevant, hipper fashion outlet than Jenna has ever worked for. In coming back to herself and her passions, Jenna makes out with a very fine, newly graduated from USC film school hottie named Eric Combs, who is almost half her age. Oh, it it turns out that Eric is Darcy’s son.
The pace of this unfolding in the book is leisurely and satisfying, but it really picks up in the Netflix movie, which I saw once at Tribeca and again at home. (I was delighted, on the second watch, to spot the author herself, Tia Williams, in the final scene.) Tia Williams has a talent for writing sex scenes and dialogue that is unforgettable. The way these two come to life on film intensified the endorphins I felt, especially the cute flirtations between other characters, and Jenna’s ride or die friends. I usually love one version of a story better than the other, but in this case, I love the Netflix movie and the book in equal measure.
I’d love to hear from you if you’ve consumed one or both versions of The Perfect Find. Did you love it? If so, why? If not, why not?
it was cute! Gab Union is so great, the clothes/styling was perfect, and they had really good chemistry!
I've been wanting to watch this but also read the book. Do you think it's better to read the book first?