The YA novel adaptation train has lost some steam in the last year. The Hunger Games series, the most prominent of these offerings, limped off the field in November, without appointing a successor. And we know it’s not the Divergent series, because Shailene Woodley and her co-stars were recently relegated to the small screen for the final installment in the franchise. But maybe it’s just the post-apocalyptic world stuff that audiences have grown weary of—at least, that’s what Netflix is banking on with its own foray into the YA adaptation arena.
Variety reports that the streaming service has secured the movie rights for Sarah Pinborough’s 13 Minutes, a YA crime novel about a teenage girl—wait, wait, hear Netflix out—who has to solve her own attempted murder. In the book, Natasha is the former leader of the Barbies, but she nearly loses her life after ditching her clique; the title’s a reference to how long the cool girl turned gumshoe was dead. Natasha sets out to uncover her would-be killer, who could very well be one of her former friends.
Netflix has brought on some Gossip Girl creators Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage to write and co-produce the adaptation. Schwartz is an old hand at this high-school melodrama stuff—he also created The O.C.—so he and Savage should easily be able to translate the intrigue for movie audiences.