Things were pretty crazy for Dana Adam Shapiro last summer. Not only was Murderball, his first directorial effort, finally going into national release after rocking festival nation-wide, but his debut novel was also being unleashed on an unsuspecting public. (The book was published just two days before the movie went into limited release - that must have been an intense week.) Entitled The Every Boy, Shapiro's novel explores the life of a drowned 15-year-old, whose death "[leaves] behind a mother who's a little obsessed with ant farms, a father devoted to his jellyfish and boxing, and five years' worth of diary entries written on 2,600 pages of loose-leaf graph paper." The book tells the boy's story though his diaries (he's very weird, but happy about it) and, though some reviewers found it a precious and cliched, Amy Sedaris says it's "Profound, not precious", and "A magical, haunting, hilarious debut." Take that, haters.

Apparently someone at Paramount also liked the book, because (through Brad Pitt's Plan B) they've optioned the rights and hired Shapiro himself to write and direct the film. Man. It's one thing to have a crappy movie made out of your book when someone else does it, but when the whole thing is in your hands? Talk about pressure.