Amazon’s original content arm, Amazon Studios, announced today that it has optioned its first novel – the horror novel Seed, written by Ania Ahlborn. The book was published by 47North, a Sci-Fi, fantasy and horror imprint of Amazon Publishing.
“Our primary objective at Amazon Studios is to develop great, commercial projects that our customers love,” said Amazon Studios Director Roy Price. “Ania Ahlborn’s SEED has been a top seller for Amazon Publishing’s 47North so we already have a sense of the mainstream attraction of the story and are excited to keep the project in-house for movie development.”
The book was released last year, and it reached the #1 spot on Amazon’s bestselling horror list (Amazon says this is due to word of mouth). It was re-released this year after Ahlborn restructured the story and added over six thousand words.
Here’s the book description (via Amazon):
With nothing but the clothes on his back—and something horrific snapping at his heels—Jack Winter fled his rural Georgia home when he was still just a boy. Watching the world he knew vanish in a trucker’s rearview mirror, he thought he was leaving an unspeakable nightmare behind forever. But years later, the bright new future he’s built suddenly turns pitch black, as something fiendishly familiar looms dead ahead.
When Jack, his wife Aimee, and their two small children survive a violent car crash, it seems like a miracle. But Jack knows what he saw on the road that night, and it wasn’t divine intervention. The profound evil from his past won’t let them die…at least not quickly. It’s back, and it’s hungry; ready to make Jack pay for running, to work its malignant magic on his angelic youngest daughter, and to whisper a chilling promise: I’ve always been here, and I’ll never leave.
Country comfort is no match for spine-tingling Southern gothic suspense in Ania Ahlborn’s tale of an ordinary man with a demon on his back. Seed plants its page-turning terror deep in your soul, and lets it grow wild.
Here’s the book trailer from Ahlborn’s YouTube channel:
Here’s a book trailer contest entry for it:
Amazon will begin testing various big screen adaptations of the book. Up until now, Amazon Studios has only optioned scripts and episodic series projects. Earlier this year, the company announced that it was in the process of putting together some sitcoms and children’s programs. Still, Seed won’t be Amazon’s only horror-themed project. Horror icon Clive Barker also signed on to assist Amazon Studios with a project called Zombies vs. Gladiators.