Given the incredible rate at which James Patterson's novels are published (several a year, although he's one of those brand-name authors like Tom Clancy who juggles his core set of books with "co-written" franchises), not to mention their enormous bestseller status, it's incredible that so few have made it to the screen. Morgan Freeman starred as detective Alex Cross in 1997's Kiss the Girls and its 2001 follow-up Along Came a Spider, there have been a couple of TV movies, and the Arads are developing his teen Maximum Ride series, but other than that...
But all that may change, with a (here's that word again) reboot of the Alex Cross series. Patterson, who still owns all the rights despite the Paramount films, is independently setting up Cross through his Patterson Entertainment production company. The twelfth novel published in the series of (so far) sixteen, Cross is an origin story, in which the titular detective is very early in his career, on the trail of his wife's murderer.
Patterson himself has "co-written" the screenplay with Kerry Williamson (who's also at work on Darren Aronofsky's Untitled Heist Thriller), and the producers are Lloyd Levin (Watchmen, Hellboy) and Patterson cohort Steve Bowen.
Kiss the Girls and Along Came a Spider were enjoyable enough, but pretty unremarkable. Does the series deserve a shot in the arm (Stephen King called Patterson a "terrible writer of dopey thrillers")? And who are we casting as the young Morgan Freeman?