Is School Spirits based on a book series? Details explored

Paramount+'s School Spirits returned with Season 2 in January 2025, and Maddie's story is bound to get more interested in her sophomore year in the afterlife.

Created by the sibling duo, Megan and Nate Trinrud, the show follows a classic 'whodunit' but with a spooky twist. Maddie Nears mysteriously dies and joins the other spirits in the afterlife of her high school. She then tries to piece together the mystery behind her death with her friends.

While School Spirits draws inspiration from various teen shows, it is not based on a book. However, after the show's idea was conceived, the Trinrud duo also adapted it into a graphic novel, which will be released in September 2025. So, in a rare case, the graphic novel is inspired by the show.

More on the School Spirits TV show and graphic novel in our story.

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Exploring the inspiration behind School Spirits TV Show and graphic novel

In an interview with Washington University, Megan Trinrud opened up about the inspiration behind School Spirits and how the TV show inspired the graphic novel.

The Trinrud sibling duo grew up watching TV shows in their teenage years, which deeply affected them. They were particularly drawn towards Dawsons Creek and Veronica Mars, which stemmed from the want to create something similar:

''“How can we take what we are feeling and turn it into something?” Taking inspiration from those shows, we decided we wanted to do a mystery, and it sort of grew from there.''

So, they started working on an idea for a TV show initially but could not go through further because of the COVID-19 pandemic. In the meantime, they got a graphic novel publishing deal, eventually leading to the creation of the TV show. In short, both mediums inspired each other:

''The whole process was all very backwards. It initially started as a plan for a TV show, but during the pandemic we met with a literary agent who told us he thought it would make a great graphic novel. We started pitching it as a graphic novel to publishers and ended up getting a book deal with Harper Collins Publishing.''

She added:

''While we were working on the book, the studio AwesomenessTV became interested in the project and wanted to make it into a TV show. It went from TV to book and back to TV.''

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When will the School Spirits graphic novel be available?

While School Spirits returned for Season 2 on January 31, 2025, the first edition of the graphic novel is complete and will be available in September 2025.

The book is developed by Megan and Nate Trinrud and Pulitzer finalist artist Maria Nguyen and is published by Harper Collins Publishing.

The official synopsis of the graphic novel reads:

''High school can feel like an eternity. For some students, it literally is . . . Maddie Graves is stuck in high school. As if that wasn’t already a nightmare—she’s also dead. But she can’t figure out how she died for the life of her.''

Megan Trinrud also talked about the transition from the TV show to the graphic novel and how it was (via Washington University):

''The transition from graphic novel to TV was surprisingly natural because, to construct the illustrations, we had been indirectly thinking about how to compose an image as filmmakers. We did have to adjust the story a little bit to suit the structure of an eight-episode series versus an ongoing novel. The heart is the same, but the way we get to show the characters and their lives is different.''

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