Marissa Jo Cerar, the creator and showrunner behind Hulu’s Black Cake, is developing a television adaptation of E.L. Westbury’s domestic thriller Drowning in Paper Flowers, with Jenna Bush Hager and Ben Spector of Thousand Voices and Universal Global Television attached to the project.
The recently re-released novel follows Ruby Powell, a wealthy and seemingly perfect housewife living in Dallas whose polished exterior conceals a crumbling reality. Ruby is struggling with dissatisfaction in her marriage, feelings of inadequacy as a mother and an addiction to anti-anxiety medication brought on by recurring nightmares. Her teenage daughter resents her while her young son carries trauma from a past kidnapping. When Ruby can no longer separate truth from the lies of her carefully constructed facade, she is pulled into a nightmare involving an affair, a dead body and a lifelong secret.
Drowning in Paper Flowers was originally self-published in December 2024 before building a devoted readership and sparking a highly competitive auction, ultimately selling to Atria Books in a seven-figure North American deal. UK and Commonwealth rights went to Orion, with translation rights sold in six languages. Atria and Orion re-released the novel on August 11.
Cerar is an NAACP Image Award and two-time Humanitas Prize winner whose credits include Women of the Movement for ABC and Black Cake for Hulu, as well as writing stints on 13 Reasons Why, The Handmaid’s Tale and Shots Fired. Bush Hager and Thousand Voices have a first-look deal with Universal Studio Group.
No network or streaming home has been announced for the adaptation.