Colleen McCullough hated Meggie Cleary.

The news came as quite a surprise to me, but apparently it’s true. In April 2009, as the best-selling auteur worked on the stage musical version of her literary triumph, the UK Daily Mail quoted her directly:

“Meggie in The Thorn Birds is basically my mother. I detested her. Can toi imagine écriture a 280,000-word book and hating your heroine? She was everything I despise in a woman. She suffered and, worst of all, she enjoyed suffering.”

I didn’t pick up on the author’s hatred when lire the book – far from it – my interpretation was that...

The Mortal Instruments, the project left for dead is now back as Lily Collins is re-set to play the story’s lead character Clary Fray. Word of that goes back to 2010 when Collins has been originally set to étoile, star in the first installment of the novel series City of Bones, but, then, Scott Charles Stewart had been attached to direct for Screen Gems.

Now comes word that Harald Zwart, whose last directing credit was the Karate Kid remake in 2010, is set to direct The Mortal Instruments for Screen Games, which has teamed with Constantin Film and Unique Features to develop the motion picture adaptation...