‘Sleepy Hollow’, the Fox TV series, is a loose adaptation of the Washington Irving short story, ‘The Legend of Sleepy Hollow’, which has been adapted many times before, most notably the 1999 Tim Burton film (also titled ‘Sleepy Hollow’). The TV series is a different beast however, and Titan Books is about to release Sleepy Hollow: Creating Heroes, Demons & Monsters by Tara Bennett and Paul Terry, as a glimpse behind the curtain of its creation. I received a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.
On the face of it, this book follows a standard structure of going through all the main characters and locations, followed by the monsters from the first two seasons, but it has been done in very nice way, leading you through the development, rather than just ticking boxes. Tara Bennett and Paul Terry have produced some excellent TV books in the past, and their expertise is on show here.
Starting from the initial ideas from co-creators Alex Kurtzman, Robert Orci, Phillip Iscove and Len Wiseman, of a show involving witches, the book explains the rationale behind expanding the scope of the Irving story and how this would fit in with the modern world; in some ways you can see how it would have been easy to fall back on the standard tropes and character formulas, but they explain how they consciously tried to avoid this.
It is also especially interesting to note various passages in the book where the producers discuss how the show has been differentiated from previous adaptations and how they have developed additional elements to make the whole thing work with the added complications of a show set in two time periods; this includes knowing when to ignore historical accuracy and allow some creativity with the truth. It is reassuring to know that showrunners aren’t just making horrible mistakes, and that stories, costumes and actions that are technically incorrect have been choices and not incompetence! 
The main text about the show isn’t the true gold in this book though, as each section of the book is well detailed, with a large number of set photographs, design sketches, floorplans, and crew comments which give an idea of how each decision was arrived at and how they have risen to the challenge of some quite complex elements on a TV budget and schedule. These images are excellent, including some brilliant maps and documents that we probably only saw a brief glimpse of in the show, if at all. There are some nice touches as well, with recurring ‘Look Closer’ boxes that give specific details about various FX processes and filming tidbits dotted throughout.
The attention to detail and quality of the material suggests that the authors really connected with the show, as well as its cast and crew, allowing them to cover every aspect extensively and give a seriously in-depth look at the world of ‘Sleepy Hollow’.
At 176 pages, this is a nice solid tome of high quality material of exactly the kind of thing you would want to see and read. This is not some cheap hack job made to make a quick buck off the success of a show, but a companion piece that the fans will love, as well as be of interest to the more neutral reader.
You can order the book HERE.
