Director Chris Weitz will be at the helm of the adaptation of his own forthcoming young adult novel, The Young World.

Warner Bros. has secured the rights to The Young World, the first in a post-apocalyptic young adult trilogy written by Chris Weitz. The rights to the project were secured by Warner Bros. after a heated auction on Friday.

The Young World tells the story of a group of teenagers trying to survive in a post-apocalyptic New York City after a catastrophic event has killed off everyone younger than 12 and older than 21. The novel is scheduled for release in July 2014, and will be published by Little, Brown.

In addition to his authorship of the novel, Chris Weitz will adapt the screenplay and direct the film version of The Young World. Weitz previously adapted and directed the 2007 film adaptation of Philip Pullman’s The Golden Compass, as well as Stephenie Meyer’s New Moon. Weitz’s production company Depth of Field will produce the film, along with Andrew Miano. The release date for The Young World film adaptation is still to be released.

The strength of the deal for The Young World may give a boost to the post-apocalyptic genre (and possibly its ubiquitous cousin, dystopian fiction.) Both genres have been deemed ‘dead’ or dying in their young adult incarnations, but perhaps stories of dying worlds still have some life left in them.

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