New Patrick Ness film in development

Entertainment company Lionsgate is to adapt Patrick Ness’ YA novel Chaos Walking: The Knife of Never Letting Go into a film starring Daisy Ridley, Variety has reported.

The magazine said Lionsgate c.e.o. Jon Feltheimer confirmed the casting on Thursday (4th August) on the company’s earnings call with Wall Street analysts. Feltheimer said the film would go into production next year, with Doug Liman as director and Doug Davison producing.

The Knife of Never Letting Go, which won the Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize in 2008, is the first novel in the Chaos Walking trilogy, set in world where all living creatures can hear each other’s thoughts. As the planet erupts into war, a boy called Todd is forced to flee, setting of on a journey with a silent girl called Viola.

The second and third books in the trilogy are The Ask and the Answer and Monsters of Men, which won the CILIP Carnegie Medal in 2011.

Another adaptation of a Patrick Ness novel, A Monster Calls, will be released in UK cinemas later this year. Ness wrote the screenplay for the film, which is being produced and distributed by River Road Entertainment, Participant Media, Lionsgate International and Focus Features, and directed by Juan Antonio Bayona.

His next book, www.thebookseller.com/news/new-patrick-ness-novel-announced-364111">Release, will be published by Walker Books in May 2017.