John N. Maclean announced on his Facebook page that his book The Esperanza Fire is slated to be adapted for a movie. He provided a link to an article in Variety which disclosed that Legendary Pictures has closed a deal to adapt it.
We talked with Mr. Maclean, who told us that while the deal has been signed, including the stipulation that he will serve as a consultant, there are many steps that have to be completed before it appears on the big screen. The producers must arrange for someone to write the screenplay, financing has to be arranged, and actors have to be signed — just to name a few.
The book is about the 2006 wildfire that Raymond Oyler lit which raced up a canyon in southern California and overran the five-person crew of U.S. Forest Service engine 57. All five crewmembers, who were protecting an unoccupied house, were killed. Oyler was found guilty of five counts of first-degree murder, 20 counts of arson, and 17 counts of using an incendiary device to start fires. He was sentenced to death.
We have an excerpt from the book in our January 21 article. It will be officially published on February 12, but is already available from Mr. Maclean’s web site, and each book will be personally autographed by him. It is also available at Amazon, but without the autograph.
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UPDATE November 12, 2013:
Esperanza Fire Factual Report, and the USDA Office of Inspector General’s Report on the fire.
John Maclean really did an excellent job writing this book from an unbiased and factual viewpoint. The only pitty is that is all true what was written and a shame offenders like Oyler are not sentenced and put to death immediately their crimes. Thank you John Maclean for this well written work of yours. May God bless the brave souls of USFS Engine 57, forever in our hearts.
I might watch it. But you have to space these things out. I read Maclean’s FIRE ON THE MOUNTAIN fairly recently. Then yesterday I started his THE THIRTYMILE FIRE and just had to set it down. I wasn’t ready for another doomed hand crew trudging off into tragedy.
Just finished the book. Very good read.