This film publicity image released by Warner Bros. Pictures shows Leonardo DiCaprio as Jay Gatsby in a scene from "The Great Gatsby."Book lovers who haven't yet read "The Great Gatsby" but hope to do so before seeing the new Baz Luhrmann film adaptation may still find themselves being influenced by the Hollywood machine. THE CANADIAN PRESS/AP Photo/Warner Bros. Pictures)

TORONTO - Book lovers who haven't yet read "The Great Gatsby" but hope to do so before seeing the new Baz Luhrmann film adaptation may still find themselves being influenced by the Hollywood machine.

Like many novels that are adapted for the big screen, the 1925 F. Scott Fitzgerald literary classic has been reprinted with a movie tie-in cover featuring the stars — in this case, a tuxedo-clad Leonardo DiCaprio looming over his castmates in all their Roaring Twenties glamour.

While movie tie-in books can drive sales of novels, they can also irk some readers who find their imaginations tainted by the cinematic interpretations depicted on the cover.

"When you read the book, it doesn't matter how they describe that character, you're most likely going to see the cover character," author David Korinetz, who runs the book distribution company Red Tuque Books in Penticton, B.C., said in a telephone interview.

Still, he said he's not bothered by movie tie-ins, noting they do what a cover is supposed to do — attract the eye.

"If I see a book sitting there and it's got an actor I recognize, I will most likely pick it up to see what it's about," said Korinetz, who's self-published three fantasy books.

"It would make no difference to me, one way or the other, whether I'm going to enjoy the book or whether I would buy it. I think it's effective and I don't think there's any stigma."

Author Alison Wearing, who recently published the memoir "Confessions of a Fairy's Daughter," feels differently.

"It cheapens the experience of the book for me. It commercializes it," said the Stratford, Ont.-based writer/performer. "I'm far, far, far less inclined to pick up a book if the cover has some sort of movie reference, even though I would have very happily picked up that novel.

"I often actually look for the old version. I'll look for it in a second-hand book store before I'll buy that new flashy, Hollywood version, because that's what it feels like."

CBC Radio "Writers & Company" host Eleanor Wachtel recalls "Notes on a Scandal" author Zoe Heller expressing dismay about the movie tie-in that had Judi Dench's image on the cover. Heller voiced her opinion during a panel discussion at the Jaipur Literature Festival in India in late January.

"She said 'No one's going to be able to read my novel now without thinking of Judi Dench,' which is not who she had in mind when she was writing the book," said Wachtel, who also hosts TIFF Bell Lightbox's "Books on Film" subscription series.

Vintage Canada publisher Marion Garner says the paperback imprint, which handled the recent movie tie-in for Yann Martel's "Life of Pi," wrestles with such issues when designing covers.

"Some people feel very strongly — editors and publishers and authors — that they don't like photographic images of what are supposed to be main characters or key characters in the book, because it does give you an association," she said.

But for "every person that doesn't want to be seen reading a classic book because it's got a star on the front, there's probably three people who are buying the book because there's a star on the front and there's a movie," added Garner.

"We are concerned about esthetic, absolutely, but we can't change what the movie art is, we can just decide not to use it," said, noting film executives decide on the art, not the publishers.

"Depending on the size of the release and star power and marketing power and everything else, it would often, I'm sure, be a silly decision not to use the movie tie-in art because of the play it was going to get in advertising and trailers and movie theatres everywhere."

Bahram Olfati, vice-president of procurement for books at Indigo Books & Music Inc., says every time there's a movie tie-in for a book, "sales go through the roof, regardless of the cover, especially if the movie is a blockbuster."

"With 'Gatsby,' we actually noticed the spike (late) last year when the original trailer came out and it's just been increasing week over week. So with movie tie-ins there is always a tremendous interest," he said.

"We're seeing it with 'Gatsby,' we saw it with 'The Road,' we saw it with 'The Memory Keeper's Daughter,' we definitely saw it with 'The Help,' and so on."

The recent movie tie-in for Martel's "Life of Pi," depicting star Suraj Sharma and a tiger drifting on a boat at sunset, was also popular, said Olfati.

"I think 'Life of Pi' hit a home run with their movie cover because it wasn't the blatant movie poster and it really depicted the story really well," he said. "And for a book that's over 10 years old ... we've sold hundreds of thousands. The sales were unbelievable."

Garner said "Life of Pi" is a good example of how a movie tie-in can give a facelift to a book that's been in print for many years while introducing it to a new generation of readers and film viewers who might not necessarily be bookworms.

Movie tie-ins also give publishers a better space in stores.

"I think retailers love the idea of having piles of movie tie-ins with big stars on them, so we like the idea of that too, of having piles of our books in the front of stores," she said. "It's such a gift when it happens that a book that's 10, 15, 20, 50, 100 years old that you've had nestled in your backlist for years is suddenly brand new."

Garner said Vintage Canada likes to get movie tie-ins in stores at least a month before the film's wide release, usually when the trailers emerge. The publisher signs a licence to use the art, which can range from a year to two years on average.

"We keep it until the DVD is out and then we usually go back to the original paperback art," she said.

And authors can have some say in what the movie tie-in will look like.

"Like when the film of 'The Time Traveler's Wife' came out, the author (Audrey Niffenegger) was adamant that she didn't want a movie tie-in anywhere in any territory," said Garner. "So that was respected and our sales did not suffer for that, either."

Olfati said a movie tie-in is "great for the book, regardless of the cover," noting "it's the content that's more important."

Still, he acknowledged there is a portion of the public that will want the original and the company will always offer both versions to accommodate all tastes.

Amazon.ca says traditional book covers generally outsell the movie-tie in editions in its online store.

And at Ben McNally Books in Toronto, it seems most readers don't want the movie tie-in.

"Any place that I've ever worked, customers don't want the movie jacket," said owner Ben McNally.

"I think because of the sense that there's a level of transience to the movie that is inimical to serious readers."

Sebastian Faulks's "Birdsong" and David Mitchell's "Cloud Atlas" are two examples of books that had movie tie-ins that were shunned by McNally's customers, he said.

"My customers said, 'Oh my God, can you get me a "Cloud Atlas" that doesn't have the movie on it? ... There was a real fury," said McNally.

"But that's my place, and when you think about how insignificant a bookstore like mine is in the big picture, it's much better that people read a good book because it has a movie on it than they don't read the book at all."

News from © The Canadian Press, 2013