Following Fox’s preemptive acquisition of the rights to the acclaimed New York Times bestseller, the film adaptation of the YA novel Children of Blood and Bone has found its director in Dope‘s Rick Famuyiwa, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
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The novel, written by Tomi Adeyemi and published in March 2018, follows a young woman in a mystical world named Orisha who witnesses the death of her mother and other magicians known as the maji by order of an unruly king and must team up with a rogue princess to avoid a crown prince, vengeful spirits and snow “leoponaires” to try and bring magic back to the land.
The 25-year-old Nigerian-American author was thrust into the spotlight with the publishing deal of Blood and Bone, which was her debut novel and sold for a seven-figure deal to Henry Holt Books. The novel, the first in a planned trilogy, also gained attention for the fact that 20th Century Fox bought the adaptation rights to the novel prior to its publication.
Marty Bowen, Issac Klausner and John Fischer are attached to produce through their production banner Temple Hill, who are most known for having brought to life the Maze Runner novels, Paper Towns and Love, Simon and The Fault in Our Stars for Fox, while Famuyiwa is attached to produce through the Verse banner.
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Famuyiwa, who is most notable for directing the acclaimed coming-of-age dramedy Dope and whose other credits include Brown Sugar, Our Family Wedding, Confirmation and an unknown number of episodes on the upcoming Disney+ series The Mandalorian, will direct the film based on a script written by David Magee (Mary Poppins Returns).
The second novel in Adeyemi’s Legacy of Orisha trilogy, Children of Virtue and Vengeance, is set to be released on June 4.
