Book vs. Movie Review: Verity
Based on the book by Colleen Hoover, this movie adaptation was supposed to be one of the biggest releases of the year. Book fans are going to be disappointed, though, with the differences…. Check out my full book vs. movie review of Verity (2026) below!
Book/Movie Information
Lowen Ashley (Dakota Johnson) is a struggling writer. She gets offered to be a ghost writer for a super famous writer named Verity Crawford (Anne Hathaway). The terms are that she has to live in Verity’s house while going through her notes for the next books. What she doesn’t realize, though, is that Verity has been deemed catatonic and unresponsive. Her husband, Jeremy (Josh Hartnett), is actually the one who wanted her to write Verity’s next book. But strange things start happening when Lowen discovers Verity’s autobiography, and things in Verity’s house are more sinister than they appear.
Book Review | Heidi Dischler
Movie Review | Heidi Dischler
Book vs. Movie (The Differences)
Here comes major spoilers so don’t go any further if you still need to read the book or watch the movie!!!
Minor Differences:
- There is no coat hanger scene where Verity tries to abort the twins (so Harper doesn’t have a scar on her face).
- There’s no scene where Verity is shoving her fingers down Harper’s throat (it’s a pillow instead that Verity uses to try and suffocate Harper until Jeremy walks in).
- Lowen never got Jeremy to install a lock for her bedroom door.
- Crew doesn’t cut his mouth on a knife in the book. That whole scene in the movie was just strange.
- It definitely wasn’t wintertime in the book. It was closer to summer with Jeremy taking the dock apart in the book.
- Lowen doesn’t sleepwalk in the movie (but does have these weird dreams that feel like hallucinations).
- Lowen didn’t stab Verity with a pushpin in the book to try and prove that she was faking it. (At least, I think this didn’t happen. I definitely don’t remember it, haha).
- I think this is a minor change (but super dumb). Lowen and Jeremy sink Verity’s body to the bottom of the lake. WHICH IS TOTALLY STUPID BECAUSE IF SHE WOULD’VE ACTUALLY DROWNED, SHE WOULD’VE HAD WATER IN HER LUNGS.
MAJOR DIFFERENCES:
- In the movie, Crew and Harper are twins and the writers decided to completely get rid of Chastin (which she was Harper’s actual twin in the book and Crew was their younger brother). This obviously changes a LOT to do with the movie vs the book because this removes the allergic reaction that killed Chastin, which also causes the watcher to not even get to see the fact that Verity really loved (at least one of) her children. You lose a lot with losing Chastin and I just wasn’t okay with it. Not to mention, it makes the lake scene come out of NOWHERE because in the book, it was right after Chastin died that Verity decides to kill just Harper (because she felt like Chastin’s death was Harper’s fault). Since that didn’t happen, Verity randomly deciding to kill her five-year-old twins made no sense whatsoever.
- Verity wasn’t trying to kill Crew in the canoe accident in the book, but in the movie, she wanted them both to die.
I was fuming the whole time I was watching the movie. One of my friends said she looked over to me in the theater and knew that I was hating the movie just because of the way my face looked haha. I really didn’t like this movie, but y’all tell me if you thought it was good because I’m totally open to discussion on this!!
