The bestselling series from Sabaa Tahir, An Ember in the Ashes, may soon make it to the silver screen. In fact, Paramount Pictures made a deal with Tahir before the author even published the first book. Some critics are saying the series could become the next great young adult franchise.
“An Ember in the Ashes could launch Sabaa Tahir into JK Rowling territory,” declares Public Radio International of #1 New York Times Bestseller. “It has the addictive quality of The Hunger Games combined with the fantasy of Harry Potter and the brutality of Game of Thrones.”
Tahir’s dystopian world centers around a young woman, Laia, who infiltrates an oppressive regime to save her captured brother. Though the setting lies in a mystical nexus between ancient Rome and Middle Eastern antiquity, Tahir’s stories also incorporate contemporary experiences. These include everything from political strife in Kashmir, to the author’s own childhood at her family’s motel in California’s Mojave Desert.
Sabaa Tahir Finds an ‘Ember in the Ashes’
After graduating from UCLA, Tahir took a job at The Washington Post. While working a late shift, Tahir began copy-editing an article that would soon become the basis for her bestselling series. The piece described the struggles faced by wives in Kashmir whose husbands were detained by security officials.
As daughter of Pakistani immigrants, this tale effected Tahir: “I couldn’t get the story out of my head…I was thinking about my own brothers…and the idea that I could live in a place where they could just be taken.”
Tahir saw a way to turn this anxiety into inspiration for fiction. She recalls asking herself: “‘What if I write a story about a world in which someone can’t fight back, but by God, she is going to try to get her family back?’ It all exploded out of that one story.”
Sabaa Tahir’s Crazy Characters
Tahir’s childhood in her parents’ 18-room motel in an isolated Mojave Desert provided further inspiration for the young author.
“There were absolutely wonderful people in the town, and I had a lot of friends there,” she recalls. “But there were a lot of people who didn’t want outsiders in the town — who felt like it was a personal affront.”
While running the motel created social and financial challenges for the Tahir and her family, its quirky guests generated all kinds of fantastic character ideas.
“Crazy people, weird people, interesting people,” she recalls. “There was this one guy who kept birds and I remember that he wanted to pay is with a bird. And when he left, he gave us a parakeet.”
The Next Great Young Adult Series
Tahir’s distinctive brand of fiction quickly captivated young adult readers. Her books repeatedly top bestseller charts. In fact, some critics suggest that Tahir’s series could be the next great young adult dystopian franchise. Many have even compared Tahir to major YA figures like J.K. Rowling and Suzanne Collins.
Now that Paramount Pictures has purchased film rights for the Ember series, fans may soon get to watch Laia’s journey to save her brother from a corrupt Empire on the silver screen. One thing is for sure, with that journey now pushing into a fourth book, the story of Laia, Elias, and the other members of Tahir’s world have a long way to go before their story ends. Fans wait with bated breath for the next installation of Tahir’s carefully crafted world. Hopefully, the wait will be short.
In the meantime, Tahir’s work can be purchased at any book retailer, including Amazon and Barnes & Noble.
