Chris Columbus, the director of classic children’s movies Home Alone, Night at the Museum and the first two Harry Potter films, is to turn his hand to writing children’s literature.
The proposed trilogy of fantasy adventure, House of Secrets, have been snapped up by HarperCollins and we be co-written with children’s author Ned Vizzini.
Set in San Francisco, House of Secrets tells the story of a pair of sibling who move into a home once owned by an occultist, and go on an adventure to find a mysterious book. Given that Columbus’s first foray into writing included the cult movies Goonies and Gremlins, readers can no doubt except plenty in the way of childhood friendships and ghoulish creatures.
He has also, eviidentally, been influenced by his relationship with J K Rowling – then again, what children’s author lucky enough to have met her wouldn’t be?
Talking to Entertainment Weekly Columbus said: "I'm not presumptuous enough to say, 'We're going to take over the Potter series', but I got to see firsthand how that series affected kids and how it got so many hundreds of thousands of kids into reading. You hope for just a section of that in terms of being able to inspire kids to read.”
Ned Vizzini has already enjoyed success with over the Atlantic with Be More Chill, his debut novel about a teenage boy who buys a pill that enables him to ‘be cool’. He began his writing career at the New York Press in his teens, where he remains a columnist.
Columbus’s other writing credits include the 1985 film Young Sherlock Holmes in which the childhood detective meets John Watson at boarding school, and an episode of the cult kid’s sci-fi cartoon Galaxy High.
House of Secrets will hit bookshops in 2013.