the lying game: book vs tv show

i came across this tv series a couple of weeks ago. gosh! i am so outdated. well, having read the book of the same name, the lying game series, i was really curious how the writers and producers of the show go about it.

 book version:

the story opens up to sutton mercer being in a place she's not familiar with. and to her surprise, seeing a dead ringer she never knew existed, her twin, emma paxton. the catch there is that no one can see or hear her. sutton thought she must be dead but she can't remember anything. 

emma, on the other hand, learned about sutton through her foster brother, travis. emma's foster brother was showing her a video of a girl, who looked exactly like her, being strangled to death. she searched about the girl in the video. emma thought she reached sutton through a message in facebook asking her to come to tuczon, arizona to meet with her long lost twin sister but it wasn't sutton. someone else set it up. and the quest for finding the truth begun.. (btw, there are four books for this series. the lying game, two truths and a lie, never have i ever, hide and seek and book five up for release, cross my heart, hope to die.)

in my opinion, the book has a lot of boring moments. there were numerous times that i thought i was so ready to give up on reading it. apparently, the author of the book, sara shepard was just trying to stretch or lengthen the story. the reason i said this was because there were a lot of unnecessary circumstances, the kind one may leave out. though i have to say shapard is good at keeping things hanging  at the end of every book. the type that will make you go read the next one. at least that was what i felt.

sutton and emmaplayed by alexandra chando

tv version:

the tv version on the other hand was about sutton mercer and emma becker's quest on finding their birth mother. it was indicated that they learned about each other for three months already. they communicated through video chat, sutton filling in emma on what she know about their parents. sutton doesn't buy what her adoptive parents, ted and kristin, told her. emma got in trouble with her foster parent, clarice and foster brother, travis so she ran away from las vegas to arizona, to sutton. when emma arrived in arizona, sutton suggested right then and there for emma to take her place so she can go search for their parents. emma didn't have time to argue so she just go with the flow. and so the lying begun..

it was a whole new different story. well, ok, i take it back.  it wasn't that different, there were just some information and character the tv left out. first, the tv series was about both sutton and emma and their journey on finding who their birth parents are. on tv, it was sutton's idea to switch their lives. and of course, to my very surprise, ethan and thayer switched personalities as in literally! the book mentioned thayer being mads (one of sutton's close friend) messed up brother with records in and out of prison and  then gone awol. ethan on the other hand was the geeky guy and the only one who knew it was emma living sutton's life. on tv it was the other way around. though thayer is still mads' brother, he was the geeky guy who just wants to live his life out of his father's view . he did went awol but just to pursue his dream of being the next big thing on computers through the app he was working on. while ethan, was the one who's been in and out of prison. ugh!

i can't expect for the writers and producers to follow everything exactly as it was written in the book. hey, they knew better! still, it was a great season one for the lying game. it will leave you craving for the next episode. it'll be a long wait until january, premiere of season two. i'm pretty excited on what will happen to emma and thayer!