Focus Features is developing a film adaptation of Maggie Stiefvater's hit young-adult novel The Scorpio Races, Heat Vision reports

Set on the fictional island of Thisby, the novel focuses on the nation's annual mystical water horse race. The event claims the lives of many of the riders who enter, and only one will be crowned the winner.

In the source material, returning champion Sean Kendrick goes up against the unprepared Puck Connolly in the deadly race.

The Focus Features deal comes after the dissolution of a 2011 agreement with Warner Bros. Screenwriter Jack Thorne (Skins, The Fades) is attached to pen the script. David Katzenberg and Seth Grahame-Smith's KatzSmith Productions will produce.

The Scorpio Races ended up on a number of best-of lists upon its release in 2011.