ALthough the book in and of itself is great and a great resource which expands your understanding of the GF Trilogy. I think they did such a great job with the movie that not reading the book is no real big loss. I mean you have the extra parts with Luci Mancini and Johnny Fontane which are great and add depth to the story as well as extensions on the movie itself. But it is still amazing how well they did adapted to book to movie.