Carnival Films options 'A Reluctant Spy' for TV

This news broke a little late yesterday for me to get a post up before heading to my launch event in Edinburgh, but as my social media notifications will attest, it's kind of big!

I'm very, very pleased (and still a little stunned tbh) to announce that Carnival Films (producers of Downton Abbey and The Last Kingdom among many others) have optioned A RELUCTANT SPY for television.

This is the last of the Very Exciting Things that I've been keeping under my hat for months, and it's a doozy. The option went to Carnival after an eight-way auction between different production houses, which was the most surreal and wonderful month and a half of my life to date. At some point I'll write a longer post about what it's like to dip your toe into the TV and film business in this way, but for now I can say that it was an absolute privilege to speak to so many passionate, creative people who had read and enjoyed my book and had amazing ideas for how to bring it to the screen.

We were sent some really amazing pitches and I had some tough moments trying to decide who to go with. It was definitely one of those 'trousers of time' moments, where you can feel all the possibilities opening out in front of you, but you need to pick only a single one - everyone we spoke to had their own take and ideas and different strengths as production companies and many of them were really appealing!

But time and again I came back to Carnival, who pulled out all the stops and sent us an amazing pitch. Their incredible track record of productions was also a significant factor.

So when is it going to be on telly?

This is the first question I get asked by many people when they hear this news. Carnival has bought an option, which is essentially a reservation on the rights to A RELUCTANT SPY. This allows them to find a scriptwriter, speak to potential directors and so on. A lot of material gets optioned, but not all of it gets made. Here's a thread from Hugh Howey all about that (on Threadreader as he appears to have bailed on Twitter).

So I will keep my hopes and expectations in check and see how it goes. And I will probably not be able to talk about things until they're announced, if it does go ahead. But to be honest, even this little dip into the world of TV and film is an absolute dream come true.

I'm heading to Bloody Scotland this afternoon, so I'll be offline until next week when I'll write up a bit more about my (AMAZING) launch event and all the exciting things that have happened during my release week. Reminder that I'm reading at 1pm in the Albert Halls tomorrow, Saturday 14th September. If you're at Bloody Scotland, please do come along!