Pure Fiction Television, the independent production company helmed by Tom Winchester (“Shogun,” “Clickbait,” “The Capture”), has secured the rights to bestselling author Dolores Redondo’s Baztan Trilogy and the prequel, “La Cara Norte Del Corazón” (The North Face of the Heart), and is developing them into a returning, premium international TV series.
The trilogy and prequel novel, which feature homicide detective Amaia Salazar, are gripping psychological thrillers infused with mystery, mythology and superstition, set in the beautiful Basque region of Northern Spain, as well as in New Orleans. The books have been translated into 39 languages.
Pure Fiction is developing the project with screenwriter and playwright Lydia Adetunji, whose credits include “His Dark Materials,” “Noughts & Crosses” and “The Last Kingdom.”
Winchester has secured the rights to all four novels having previously optioned “La Cara Norte Del Corazón” whilst president of Heyday Television. German producer Peter Nadermann previously owned the film rights to the Baztan trilogy of novels and will act as an executive producer on the series.
The adaptation will be in Spanish and English.
Winchester intends to bring an authentic European feel to the series, which will have a truly global appeal and be housed within his burgeoning slate of “Prestige Commercial” content: elevated, bold drama, which is ambitious in style and scale, yet unashamedly entertaining and with a commercial sensibility.
Winchester said: “When I first read ‘The North Face of the Heart’ I couldn’t put it down. It’s a unique mix of supernatural crime drama, psychological thriller and epic disaster movie. All of the Baztan novels are real page-turners, featuring an intelligent and emotionally intuitive female lead in Amaia. Dolores already has a global fanbase and in Lydia Adetunji we have found a world-class screenwriter who will bring Amaia to life for a whole new audience via this premium adaptation.
“We want to keep true to Dolores’s visceral Spanish sensibility and intend to work with European partners to bring an epic and authentic feel to the series, something Pure Fiction is hugely passionate about; developing big, bold returning series that subvert expectation and have something to say about the world in which we live.”
Pure Fiction is also in latter stages of development on a major high-end adaptation of the “Rivers of London” series of bestselling books, short stories, novellas and graphic novels by Ben Aaronovitch.
