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Keira Knightley stars in this adaptation of the Ruth Ware novel that makes substantial changes from the book. The Woman in Cabin 10: All the major differences b

Keira Knightley stars in this adaptation of the Ruth Ware novel that makes substantial changes from the book.

The Woman in Cabin 10: All the major differences between the book and the movie

Keira Knightley stars in this adaptation of the Ruth Ware novel that makes substantial changes from the book.

By Maureen Lee Lenker

Maureen Lee Lenker

Maureen Lee Lenker is a senior writer at ** with over nine years of experience. An award-winning journalist, she's written for Turner Classic Movies, *Ms. Magazine*, *The Hollywood Reporter*, and more.

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October 11, 2025 8:00 a.m. ET

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- Ruth Ware's 2016 thriller, *The Woman in Cabin 10, *is now a major motion picture.

- The Netflix film stars Keira Knightley as a reporter plunged into a deadly conspiracy while on assignment on a luxury yacht.

- Here are all the biggest changes from page to screen.

Adaptation can be a tricky art — one has to translate a story from page to screen, honoring the novel enough to keep loyal readers engaged while also altering details to account for changing tastes, enhancing the cinematic quality of a scene, and more.

*The Woman in Cabin 10, *which hit Netflix on Oct. 10, is the latest bestseller to be turned into a film, based on the 2016 novel of the same name by thriller writer Ruth Ware.

Keira Knightley in 'The Womman in Cabin 10'.

Parisa Taghizadeh/Netflix

The movie, co-written and directed by Simon Stone, stars Keira Knightley as Laura, an investigative journalist reeling from the murder of a trusted source. When she's invited to join a luxury cruise at the behest of a noted philanthropist, her editor urges her to go — only for her to end up plunged into dangerous waters where nothing is what it seems.

Here, we run down the biggest differences between the book and the film.

Laura's PTSD

**On the page, Laura's PTSD is more easily dismissed — instead of witnessing the murder of a source, she's trapped within her own home while it's being burglarized. It's still a horrifying experience that would traumatize most people, but it's not quite the same as the international intrigue behind the movie Laura's demons.

Laura's career

**Laura is a journalist on both page and screen. But in the film, she seems to be an investigative reporter, digging into political secrets and the criminal underworld. She's invited on the ship to take a break from the hard-hitting stories that have shaken her up. In the book, the trip is much more aligned with her day-to-day work. Laura writes for travel magazine *Velocity, *and she's invited aboard the luxury yacht as part of a new tour they're offering to see the Northern Lights.

Stone felt that Laura's more robust history as an investigative journalist was key to the story he wanted to tell. "It takes a quite remarkable person to have the kind of resilience to go through what she does in this film," he tells *. *"It's okay for her to have had a little bit of training for it."

Keira Knightley and David Ajala in 'The Woman in Cabin 10'.

Parisa Taghizadeh/Netflix

**The movie version of Laura is very much single, still nursing the heartache of her break-up with fellow journalist Ben (David Ajala), who is also on the cruise. In the novel, Ben is also on board, but their relationship is far in the past. Instead, Laura is on the rocks with her current boyfriend, Judah, who recently turned down a job in New York to stay with her in England.

Laura's drinking problem

**The movie finds a much more put-together Laura, a woman who is being gaslit by everyone around her. The book offers a far less reliable protagonist. Laura has developed a heavy drinking habit to cope with her PTSD following the break-in, making those around her and readers less certain about whether they should believe the things she claims to have seen.

Despite the novel's use of the unreliable female narrator trope, Stone wanted to avoid that altogether. "I remembered all these films from the post-Watergate era," he explains, "about an average person that finds themselves in the midst of a conspiracy going, 'There's something going on here that is bigger than me, and I need to find out what it is.'"

Kaya Scodelario and Keira Knightley in 'The Woman in Cabin 10'.

Parisa Taghizadeh/Netflix

However, while those films revolved around male heroes played by the likes of Gene Hackman, Robert Redford, and Warren Beatty, Stone thought it was high time to center a movie of this ilk around a female protagonist. "Usually when it's a woman, you are questioning her mental health," he says. "Here, I have other characters try to do it, but I didn't ever want her to start doubting herself. The self-reflexiveness of immediately doubting your own sanity and pills, drugs, alcohol, and mental health problems being involved — if there were the equal number of films and books about men questioning their sanity, then I'd feel okay with that as a trope. But the fact that we always make them about women feels to me like a conspiracy against the integrity of women. It's not my experience that the least reliable people are women."

***Get your daily dose of entertainment news, celebrity updates, and what to watch with our EW Dispatch newsletter.*****

Meeting with Anne

**The film reveals that it was the yacht owner, Richard Bullmer's wife, Anne (Lisa Loven Kongsli), who invited Laura on board. Dying of cancer, she has changed her will, wanting to leave all her money to medical research. She meets Laura the first evening on board and tells her this in private. This meeting doesn't occur in the novel, as Laura is assigned to go on the trip as part of her work as a travel journalist and has no connection to Anne or Richard.

Guy Pearce in 'The Woman in Cabin 10'.

Parisa Taghizadeh/Netflix

The woman in cabin 10

**The circumstances surrounding how Laura sees the mysterious woman in cabin 10 vary greatly between the film and the novel. In the novel, Laura knocks on the door, hoping to borrow mascara, and the girl in question answers the door, even lending her the mascara. The movie finds Laura sneaking into the room, thinking it's hers, as she tries to avoid running into her ex-boyfriend Ben in the hall. Realizing she's in the wrong room, she sees a woman in a hoodie and apologizes for barging in on her.

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Fancy a swim?

**In the film, Laura is terrorized much more purposefully throughout the boat trip, leaving the guests increasingly concerned about her mental health. Pushed off the top deck of the yacht, she plunges into the onboard swimming pool below as someone then starts closing the automated pool cover, presumably hoping to lock her in and drown her. This event doesn't occur in the novel at all.

Keira Knightley in 'The Woman in Cabin 10'.

Parisa Taghizadeh/Netflix

Trapped at sea

On both page and screen, Carrie, the woman pretending to be Anne, lures Laura to the ship's hold and traps her there. However, on the page, Laura is trapped there for an indeterminate amount of time, and Carrie is less willing to help her. Laura also goes into withdrawal because she doesn't have access to her medication. She attacks Carrie to get access to her anti-depressants, and that's when she realizes that Carrie has been impersonating Anne. Carrie is in love with Richard, defends him, and even punishes Laura by starving her for multiple days. In the film, Laura is in the hold for a maximum of 24 hours, and Carrie is far more empathetic to Laura's needs.

Carrie's background

**In the film, Carrie is a highly sympathetic character. Her exact background is never made clear, but she speaks with a slight Eastern European accent and says she is trying to give her daughter a better life. Richard finds her using facial recognition software and contacts her via Facebook. Thus, it's clear her participation in the scheme stems from desperation and love for her daughter.

In the novel, she's more mercenary. She's a struggling actress looking for a big break, as well as a waitress who happened to meet Richard while he was out at his club one night. Instead of being purely driven by a life-changing amount of money, Carrie has feelings for Richard, having carried on a clandestine affair with him before their murder plot.

Keira Knightley and Daniel Ings in 'The Woman in Cabin 10'.

Parisa Taghizadeh/Netflix

Ben's sacrifice

The body count is far higher in the film, and poor Ben doesn't escape with his life. Laura's ex waffles between questioning her outlandish claims and eventually supporting her. In the film, Laura tells him the truth about what's happening, and he dies in an attempt to protect her from the yacht's doctor, who is trying to kill her with a tranquilizer. This fight and Ben's death don't occur in the novel.

Laura goes overboard in both the film and the novel, but the circumstances vary. In both cases, she fears being caught by Bullmer as she tries to escape the ship. But in the novel, she accidentally slips while hiding over the side of the veranda. In the film, she chooses to jump and swim to shore to save her life.

David Ajala in 'The Woman in Cabin 10'.

Parisa Taghizadeh/Netflix

The big reveal

**The novel finds Laura running for her life in Norway, eventually taking refuge in a remote barn until a farmer helps her call her boyfriend, Judah, who arranges her rescue. She presumes Carrie is dead, killed by Bullmer, and Bullmer is reported to have died by suicide. The film offers a far more action-packed climax.

Laura, who has convinced Carrie to help her, interrupts a gala presentation being made in Anne's honor. She tells the audience that they need to know the truth, revealing Bullmer's murder of Anne and the scheme to forge her will and keep her inheritance. Bullmer attempts to discredit her until Carrie, dressed as Anne, backs her up. Bullmer draws a gun, and the trio is involved in a chase down to the dock, where Bullmer is shot.

Stone wrote this climactic conclusion only two weeks before shooting it, as he sought to hone in on the right ending for the film. "[I knew] I needed the hero's ending," he says. "The boat felt like a castle that an unknown journalist was being invited to, one ruled over by an enigmatic and charismatic couple. So, it needed this epic conclusion to that epic scenario. We needed real revenge, real justice, as opposed to an escape for the lead character from danger."

Keira Knightley in 'The Woman in Cabin 10'.

Parisa Taghizadeh/Netflix

Carrie's fate and Laura's future

**In the novel, Carrie is presumed dead, and Jonah rescues Laura. Laura decides to quit her job as a travel writer and move to New York with Jonah, where she will pursue her old dream of investigative reporting. After the bodies of Anne and Bullmer are recovered from the North Sea, Laura is wired 40,000 Swiss Francs, confirming that Carrie is alive after all.

The movie gives a much more conclusive ending to Bullmer and Carrie, sending a vindicated Laura back to her reporter job, where she's earned even more respect from her colleagues after exposing this conspiracy. Instead of wiring Laura money, Carrie sends a video over text showing Laura footage of her daughter playing, indicating that she has found her longed-for safety.**

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