Is Netflix’s ‘Damsel’ based on a book?

Millie Bobby Brown and Netflix never miss. Four (soon to be five) mega-successful seasons of Stranger Things and two super-popular Enola Holmes movies speak for themselves. Now, the British actress is reuniting with the streaming monolith for a third IP, with an all-new flavor. This time, Brown is leaving 1980s nostalgia and Victorian crime-solving behind to play in the fairy tale fantasy sandbox, but with a dark, feminist twist.

In Damsel, Brown plays Princess Elodie, a young noblewoman dutybound to marry a handsome prince (Nick Robinson), but Elodie’s marriage immediately hits the rocks — literally — when her new hubbie yeets her into a cave and she learns she’s being sacrificed to a dragon to pay an ancient debt. Co-starring an A-list supporting cast including Robin Wright, Ray Winstone, and Angela Bassett doing the thing, Damsel promises to be Netflix’s next must-see original movie.

But, wait, is Damsel a fully original piece of intellectual property? Enola Holmes, for instance, is based on a book series by author Nancy Springer. Is Damsel based on a book too?

The Damsel novel and how it connects to the Netflix movie

Here’s the confusing answer: there is a Damsel novel, but the movie isn’t based on it. In fact, in this case, the book is based on the movie. If you saw the trailer and thought “boy, this sure seems like the kind of story that BookTok would go crazy for,” clearly someone at Netflix had the same thought as a YA fantasy novel inspired by the film has already come out.

While Damsel hits Netflix on March 8, 2024, the Damsel novel was released in April 2023. This was presumably intended to come out alongside the film, but shake-ups with the streamer’s release schedule kept the Brown vehicle back until 2024. The order of the two products suggests the former inspired the latter but actually it’s the opposite. The book’s Amazon description confirms the film came first:

“A damsel in distress takes on the dragon herself in this epic twist on classic fantasy. Based on a screenplay by Dan Mazeau, this is a groundbreaking collaboration between New York Times bestselling author Evelyn Skye and the team behind the upcoming Netflix film Damsel, starring Millie Bobby Brown.”

So, yes, that’s the other thing. Although Brown is a bonafide best-selling author herself these days, after having released period romantic novel Nineteen Steps — based on the life of her grandmother — in 2023, she did not write this book. The Damsel novelization is penned by Evelyn Skye, author of The Crown‘s Gate series, and you can go read it now to get a taste of what the movie has in store.