Screen Gems has acquired The Rule of Three, Deadline reports, an upcoming horror novel by Sam Ripley, a pseudonym for an unnamed but well-established author.

Temple Hill’s Marty Bowen and Wyck Godfrey will produce the film; the pair are just coming off the successful horror flick Smile, which itself already has a sequel in the works. Simon & Schuster UK have set the book’s release for June 2023, stating that Sam Ripley is a pseudonym for a “bestselling British author whose works have sold over a million copies globally”. They may choose to divulge the author’s identity at a later date, but for now it remains up for speculation.

The Rule of Three begins as so:

Don’t forget The Rule of Three
It’s coming for you
Like it came for me.

Can you change your own fate? That question haunts three women. As they become increasingly convinced that a mysterious urban myth called the Rule of Three is real, they must find a way to break the curse or be doomed to die like those who came before them. But when you’re not sure if what you think is happening is even the truth, how do you know if you are actually in danger? And if you don’t know, how will you be able to protect yourself? If death comes in threes, who will survive, and who will solve the Rule of Three?