The BookTok sensation Fourth Wing will take flight in a television adaptation thanks to Amazon MGM Studios and Michael B. Jordan’s Outlier Society.
Deadline reported that the deal to adapt the first novel in Rebecca Yarros’ The Empyrean series was brokered prior to the Writers Guild of America strike and was the subject of a heated bidding war. This news will not come as a surprise to readers with any degree of presence on social media, as the fantasy title has held BookTok in a vice grip since its April release. The book’s evangelic word of mouth campaign translated into Fourth Wing spending thirteen weeks in the number on spot on the New York Times Best Seller list.
Related: Best Fantasy Books Coming in November 2023
Though the planned television adaptation will solely tackle the events of Fourth Wing, success could yield subsequent series from The Empyrean saga. In addition to Fourth Wing, Amazon MGM Studios has likewise secured the rights to Yarros’ upcoming sequel, Iron Flame. According to Yarros, the Empyrean series will span five novels, with the highly anticipated second installment arriving Nov. 7, 2023. As with previous book sensations such as Harry Potter and Twilight, the hype surrounding Iron Flame has revitalized the bookstore midnight release model, with many stores hosting Nov. 7 events for Yarros’ readers.
Fourth Wings tells the story of 20-year-old Violet Sorrengail as she reconciles her planned life as a scholar with her mother’s course correction into the exponentially more brutal reality of the Riders Quadrant at Basgaith War College. The novel capitalizes on beloved trends such as fantasy academia and enemies to lovers, making it popular with fans of massive fantasy romance hits such as Sarah J. Maas’ A Court of Thorns and Roses series. The central role of dragons in Yarros’ series will also likely pique the interest readers who grew up on Christopher Paolini’s Eragon series or even Anne McCaffery’s Dragonriders of Pern.
Fourth Wing marks Yarros’ first sojourn into television production, as she’ll serve as executive producer on the series alongside Liz Pelletier. The Empyrean series is far from the only popular contemporary fantasy series to receive a streaming adaptation with Leigh Bardugo’s Grishaverse explored in Netflix’s Shadow and Bone at Netflix and Maas’ aforementioned A Court of Thorne and Roses, currently in development at Hulu.
