How I cast celebrities for my book reviews

If you are a regular reader of my book reviews, you know that I add my possible cast at the end of each review. I have kind of a system to do that and thought I’d share it with you guys.

Whenever I read a book I try pay extra attention on the appearance of characters. I always mark the pages, so that I can get back to them.

The first thing I usually look at is the colour of the hair and then of course also the length and other details like curly or straight. On the same level I say the eye colour. Then I always have in mind their body type, height, weight etc.  (if it is mentioned). With these infos I go to pinterest and look for suitable actors, actresses, models or other famous people. I usually type in something like “actress blonde blue eyes”. Then I just scroll through the pictures and try to find the best fir. This is always from my point of view of course, it has nothing to do with the author’s vision. I can’t get into their heads after all. I also google people and look at lists on listal or IMDB. Sometimes I’m so into the book and really love the characters that I already have a certain person in mind. Then it doesn’t really matter, whether the hair colour is the right one.

There are certain books, where you don’t read anything about the appearance of a character. Then I just go with my feeling.

When looking for couples or siblings I try to go for real life relationships. It just makes sense and I feel that they are a real fit in the end. I could always pick the same actors and chose my celebrity crush for my book boyfriends, but I always look for unknown celebrities as well. I think in the beginning that was my biggest problem.

Finding the right cast is actually a lot of fun. I look at the characters and their personalities and then try to find the best person for that job. With sport stars/characters I tend to pick sport stars as well, same with musicians or artists.

I also cast kids, which is not that easy, because the same kid actors always show up or others that are much older now. Here the lists are the most important thing.

Sometimes I ask authors in my Q&A what their dream cast would be, most of the time that has no influence on my own casting. However, it’s still very interesting to see what they have in mind for their characters. Then there is the reaction of the authors to my casting. I get a lot of feedback from them, which makes me really happy.

The casting is something that make my reviews unique and special. I’ve done it from the start and they are a very important part of my reviews.