Turning a book into a Hollywood film can be a tortuous business, from securing author rights and getting directors and screenwriters on board to pitching to studios. But for Remain , a supernatural love story set on Cape Cod, the usual conventions went out the window.

Conceived simultaneously as a book and a movie, Remain is a one-of-a-kind collaboration between Nicholas Sparks, author of 25 romance novels including The Notebook and Message in a Bottle , and seller of 150 million books, and M. Night Shyamalan , director of hit movies The Sixth Sense and Signs . While the novel is published this week, the film, which stars Jake Gyllenhaal and Phoebe Dynevor and is currently in post-production, is due for release in October 2026.

When Sparks’s team first floated the idea in

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