Sony TV Acquires Two Novels By ‘Long Bright River’ Author Liz Moore For Series Development

EXCLUSIVE: Sony Pictures Television is expanding its relationship with Long Bright River author Liz Moore, acquiring her novels The God of the Woods and The Unseen World for series development.

Original Film’s Neal H. Moritz and Pavun Shetty, who are executive producing Peacock’s Long Bright River limited series adaptation based on Moore’s novel as part of their first-look deal with Sony, are executive producing both projects.

The God of the Woods, currently on the New York Times bestseller list, was recently featured in the summer edition of The Fallon Book Club, where Tonight Show fans get to vote for their favorite summer book.

Set in the summer of 1975, The God of the Woods revolves around 13-year-old Barbara Van Laar who vanishes from the grounds of a summer camp owned by her own family. The timing of her disappearance is suspicious: just up the hill, at the family’s grand summer home, a glamorous week-long party is in full swing. Heightening the mystery is an earlier tragedy: Barbara’s brother, Bear, also went missing two decades prior, just before Barbara was born. Though he was never found, it is widely believed that the culprit in his disappearance was a landscaper who subsequently died. But many of the people in the nearby town of Shattuck—from which nearly all the staff on the grounds commute each day—have a different theory. One that involves another member of the Van Laar family. 

In The Unseen World, Ada Sibelius is raised by David, her brilliant, eccentric, socially inept single father, who directs a computer science lab in 1980s-era Boston. Home-schooled, Ada accompanies David to work every day; by twelve, she is a painfully shy prodigy. The lab begins to gain acclaim at the same time that David’s mysterious history comes into question. When his mind begins to falter, leaving Ada virtually an orphan, she is taken in by one of David’s colleagues. Soon after she embarks on a mission to uncover her father’s secrets: a process that carries her from childhood to adulthood. The series portrays a woman at the top of her game in a STEM-related field that has historically been dominated men and examines the emotional bonds we form with each other via technology, and sometimes with the technology itself. 

Co-created and executive produced by Moore, Peacock’s suspense thriller Long Bright River stars Amanda Seyfried as Mickey, a police officer who patrols a Philadelphia neighborhood hard-hit by the opioid crisis. When a series of murders begins in the neighborhood, Mickey realizes that her personal history might be related to the case.  

Nikki Toscano (The Offer, Hunters) and Moore executive produce, with Toscano serving as showrunner.  Moritz, Shetty and Amanda Lewis executive produce for Original Film and Amy Pascal executive produces for Pascal Pictures. Seyfried is an executive producer. Russell Rothberg also serves as an executive producer. Hagar Ben-Asher (Bad Boy, Dead Women Walking) directs and serves as executive producer on the first episode. The series comes from Sony Pictures Television and UCP, a division of Universal Studio Group.

Moore is repped by The Gernert Company and WME.