'Harry Potter' director Chris Columbus takes on children's books
After creating family-friendly entertainment with such films as the first two "Harry Potter" movies and the 1990 hit 鈥�Home Alone,鈥� director-producer-screenwriter Chris Columbus is turning to children鈥檚 books.
Columbus, who also directed the 2010 film 鈥�Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief,鈥� has contracted to write a trilogy of children鈥檚 books for publisher HarperCollins, according to Entertainment Weekly. The books will be co-written with author Ned Vizzini, the writer of 2007鈥檚 鈥淚t鈥檚 Kind of a Funny Story.鈥�
The books will be aimed at middle-schoolers, and the series has a working title of "House of Secrets." The books will focus on the Pagett siblings, who, with their parents, move into a house that was once owned by a fantasy author. The Pagetts are forced to go on a mysterious mission to save their parents and find out the truth behind their family. The first book has a planned release date of the spring, 2013.
Columbus told Entertainment Weekly that the transition to a writing process has not been a difficult one for him and that he was inspired to write children鈥檚 books after seeing how much the "Harry Potter" series affected young readers.
鈥淵ou hope for just a section of that in terms of being able to inspire kids to read,鈥� Columbus said. 鈥淎nd that鈥檚 really one of the themes of the book 鈥� that reading is essential to your development as a child and as an eventual adult. That really has inspired us in moving forward.鈥�
Molly Driscoll is a Monitor contributor.
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