Bestselling Christian fiction author Karen Kingsbury is taking book-to-film adaptations into her own hands with the launch of Karen Kingsbury Productions. Kingsbury’s over 70 books, which have been primarily published by Simon & Schuster imprints Howard and Atria, have sold over 30 million copies, according to a release announcing the production company’s launch.
Several of Kingsbury’s titles have been previously adapted for both film and television, including Maggie’s Christmas Miracle, A Time to Dance, and The Bridge, which appeared on the Hallmark Channel in 2017, 2016, and 2015, respectively. Also, Like Dandelion Dust (Center Street, 2006) appeared in theaters in 2009. And A Thousand Tomorrows, based on Kingsbury’s 2005 book, is scheduled to premiere in December on Pure Flix, the streaming service that features family and faith-based movies and series.
Now, however, Kingsbury and her team will have full creative control over every book-to-film project through the author-owned production company. “By producing our own films, we hope to give a wide audience everywhere an experience they haven’t yet had,” Kingsbury tells PW. “Through the years, I have learned many things about making a beautiful picture. But this will take my movies and TV shows to an entirely different level."
The first Karen Kingsbury Productions project is “one of my best selling standalone novels from the past few years,” Kingsbury says. “Very soon we will release the title and key talent.” Filming starts in Tennessee and Alabama on October 9.
The company, which has its own YouTube channel with over 10,000 subscribers already, will initially look to release this project and future films to theaters before contracting deals with streaming services, it says. Though Kingsbury expects a second season of A Thousand Tomorrows to appear on Pure Flix next year, Karen Kingsbury Productions will prodcue all other Kingsbury book adaptations in the future.
Kingsbury’s books routinely chart on PW’s Religion Fiction Bestsellers list, and she has nearly 500,000 followers across Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. During an interview with PW in 2016, Kingsbury discussed drawing on her Christian faith in her writing as well as other sources of inspiration. “I call myself an emotional detective,” she said. “I can see emotional things playing out in front of me, and those things can be the beginning of a story.”