Sony Pre-empts Blake Crouch Novel ‘Dark Matter’ For $1.25 Million

EXCLUSIVE: Sony Pictures is deep in negotiations to make a pre-emptive $1.25 million deal for Dark Matter, a novel by Blake Crouch that is based on a 150-page partial manuscript. I’m hearing that Matt Tolmach will produce this and that Sony president Michael De Luca oversaw the deal with exec Rachel O’Connor. The book’s described to me as a high-concept sci-fi thriller in the vein of Memento and Looper. The author will write the script when he completes the book. His Wayward Pines sold to Fox for a 10-part TV series in 2015 that will be directed by M. Night Shyamalan and star Matt Dillon, Carla Gugino, Terrence Howard and Toby Jones. The book deal was brokered by Angela Cheng Caplan for lit agent David Hale Smith. It’s a hot book; the publishing rights for North America sold last Friday to Crown for more than $1 million. Tolmach’s exec Brad Zimmerman brought it in. Stay tuned, I will tell you more tomorrow when I know it.