The story of the Netflix mini-series is rendered so lovingly that many viewers have speculated on One Day being based on a true story, suggestive of the reverence and respect the showrunners had for the source material. The book was already adapted once only two years after its release, with 2011's One Day, starring Anne Hathaway. Though the movie was more accurate to the original novel, Netflix's slight variation on the story achieves much greater heights, presenting a more compelling love story compared to the critically-panned film.

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10 The Netflix Series Moves Every Day One Year Forward

The book's chronology is slightly tweaked

Both the One Day Netflix series and the original book chronicle Dexter and Emma's lives over the course of 20 years, each episode and chapter roughly getting assigned July 15th of a given year. While the show makes an irable attempt to keep things period-appropriate, beginning at the same time in 1988, it jumps ahead when it comes to Dexter's rise to TV stardom and Emma moving in with Tilly. In the novel, these events occur one year later, in 1991 rather than 1990, skipping some relatively uneventful scenes from the book that weren't necessary to include in the show.

9 Emma's Novels Are Modified To Fit Her Casting

Julie Criscoll wouldn't make sense for Ambika Mod

Despite being relatively new to acting, Ambika Mod's performance as Em grounds the cast of One Day with a powerful anchor to revolve around. Re-tooling Emma's character to be biracial to this great casting didn't have much of an effect on the story, save for the protagonist of Emma's novels. In the book, Emma writes about a woman named Julie Criscoll who travels the world, clearly a stand-in for herself. In the series, this self-insert is re-named Nisha Halliday, reflecting Ambika Mod's own heritage.

8 The Opening Day Is Different

One day at a time, the Netflix series made slight tweaks

Dex and Em's fateful first date in Arthur's Seat is kept relatively similar in the Netflix series, as the two eschew a brief physical spark in favor of a heartfelt conversation about their present and future lives. While the show presents this meeting right away, the book instead opens with Emma and Dexter lying in bed together, chatting with already a clearly-established history. Spoiling the reveal of Emma and Dexter's first meeting early on may have been a gamble, but it did lay a solid foundation for their chemistry while keeping the challenging timeline from being any more confusing.

7 Emma's Meeting With Her Publisher Isn't Shown

The book delves further into Emma's developing career

The One Day show skips over an embarrassing scene in which Emma meets with a publisher in 1997, who mistakenly believed she was applying to be a simple nanny. Instead, Emma's transition into a successful writer is smoother and more sudden, details like publisher meetings being handled off-screen. Meanwhile, Dexter's firing from his lofty position as a TV personality is similarly shortened, being melded into a simple phone call from his agent. This change helps to streamline the story and show the diverging success of Dex and Em's respective career paths more prominently, a smart choice by One Day's editors.

6 The One Day Series Upgrades Tilly’s Husband

Graham is a clear upgrade over Malcolm

In both the book and the show, Emma's friend Tilly winds up getting married, but the name and personality of her betrothed got a little bit of a re-work for the adaptation. In the book, Tilly marries Malcolm, an entirely forgettable character who blends far into the background. While the focus is obviously on Emma and Dexter, Tilly's own love life is instead re-tooled in the show, marrying a different man named Graham who gets to steal a few scenes later on as a hilarious ing character.

5 Tilly And Emma Are Closer Friends

Book Tilly wasn't much of a girl's girl

Tilly and Emma's relationship in the series is portrayed as much closer than they are in the books, with Emma not giving a speech or even being a bridesmaid at Tilly's wedding in the novel. Not only that, but Tilly even sleeps with Dexter in the book despite knowing his history with her friend. This scummy behavior isn't dwelt on in the book, but is smartly cut out altogether in the Netflix adaptation, making Tilly a stronger ing character for Emma to bounce off of instead.

4 The Greece Trip Plays Out Differently

Dexter evades a theif in the Netflix adaptation

During Dexter and Emma's spontaneous trip to Greece, the two bond while fighting off some steamy sexual tension that Emma at first tries to avoid. When the two go skinny-dipping in the novel, Dex returns to find his clothes stolen by a local prankster, forced to make a nude sprint back to the loft. This scene is cut out of the series to instead focus on Emma's hesitance to indulge Dexter's scandalous ideas, clearly demonstrating a wariness of her former fling's newfound party boy reputation.

3 Ian And Dexter Have A Heart-To-Heart In Person

The book's letter wouldn't have played out as well in live-action

After Emma's devastating death, Dexter finds some surprising consolation in Ian, Emma's ex and collateral damage in her pursuit of Dex. While the book sees him sending a well intentioned letter to Dexter on the first anniversary of Emma's death in 2005, the show instead has them meet face-to-face, Ian evidently being welcome enough in Emma and Dexter's friend group. It works a lot better for the visual medium to show Ian's kind words in person, rather than a cliché voice-over as Dexter reads his letter.

2 Emma Lives For Longer In The Book

After finally getting together, the show don't give Em and Dex much time to enjoy their relationship

Following years of near-misses, One Day finally pays off Emma and Dexter's will-they-won't-they, only to cruelly wrench it away with the death of Em. As if that weren't bad enough, the series drastically cuts down how much time the audience gets to spend with the at-long-last united couple, with Emma dying by the end of 2002 rather than making it to 2004 as she did in the book. Giving just one more episode spanning 2002 to 2004 would've been a great move for the series to make, indulging viewers just a little bit more before emotionally destroying them with Emma's accident.

1 The Ending Cuts Out Dexter’s New Love Interest

Maddy's romance with Dex is nowhere to be found in Netflix series

One Day's most dramatic deviations from the source material come from the end of the novel, in which Dexter eventually moves on from Emma's death and finds new love yet again in Maddy, the café manager. The book concludes with Dex visiting Arthur's Seat with her and Jasmine, echoing his first meeting with Emma. Instead, One Day chooses to allow Dex to move on from the catastrophe without the need of a rebound love interest, instead visualizing Emma personally pleading with him to do so on his own , a thoughtful and worthy change from the novel's narrative.