News: New Line and Witherspoon in "Dark Wood"

New Line Cinema and Reese Witherspoon’s Pacific Standard have won the bidding for 2015’s hit summer book In a Dark Dark Wood. In the mold of the works of Agatha Christie, the novel centers on reclusive crime writer Lenora Shaw, who reluctantly accepts her old friend’s invitation to spend the weekend together in an eerie glass house, hidden away in the English countryside. Forty-eight hours later, she awakens in a hospital with injuries and no memory of what occurred, though armed with the bitter knowledge that someone is dead. She then sets out to discover the truth about the weekend’s events by uncovering secrets and hidden agendas, forced to revisit haunting aspects of her past that she wished to keep buried.

Written by first timer novelist Ruth Ware, the book hit shelves on August 4th, via Gallery/Scout Press. The mystery, similar to hit thrillers like Gone Girl and The Girl on the Train, topped “best summer books” lists from Entertainment Weekly, Buzzfeed, BookReporter, Amazon, and Publishers’ Weekly.

Witherspoon and Bruna Papandrea will produce under their Pacific Standard banner. Ellen Goldsmith-Vein is also producing for The Gotham Group, while Andrea Johnston, Richard Brener, and Walter Hamada oversee for New Line.

Witherspoon and Papandrea, who both produced Gone Girl, have been picking up top books a lot as of late, with Opening Belle set at Warner Brothers, Napkin Notes also at New Line, and Ashley’s War at Fox 2000.

Have a thriller of your own? Submit it to ScreenCraft's Action & Thriller Screenplay Contest!

Source: The Tracking Board