Mr. Monk Meets “Longstreet”

In a post on his Writer’s Life blog, novelist-screenwriter Lee Goldberg tells the story behind tonight’s episode of the TV series Monk. It seems the basic plot comes from Goldberg’s TV tie-in novel Monk Goes to the Firehouse, released earlier this year, but a central concept change (suggested by the show’s creator) ultimately “meant throwing out just about everything in [the] book.” For those of us who abhor the task of rewriting anything longer than a grocery list, this sounds like a nightmare. But Goldberg pronounces himself pleased with the results.