Dan Brown is one of the best selling authors in the world. Propelled into immense popularity by his novel The Da Vinci Code, Brown has since sold ungodly amounts of his most famous works, Da Vinci, Angels & Demons, and The Lost Symbol which sold more than a million copies on the day of its release.

Two of those novels have been adapted into films and while they’ve made quite a bit of money for Sony, as adaptations they were monstrosities, especially Angels and Demons. According to THR, Sony is looking to avoid that same fate for The Lost Symbol, so the book’s author has signed on to finish writing and reworking the script. This is the first time Brown has been involved with this process.

With Brown on board, expect to hear more news about The Lost Symbol sooner rather than later. Assuming they don’t want to dilly-dally getting this one into theaters, we’ll probably be hearing about Tom Hanks reprising his role as the film’s lead Robert Langdon, as well as Ron Howard who will most likely return to the helm.

With 2011 just over a week away, 2012 looks like a probable release date for the film. There is a three year gap between the release dates of Da Vinci and Angels & Demons so that theory fits, not to mention that if they wait much longer they will start to lose their built-in audience. Here’s hoping Brown is as adept a screenwriter as he is an author.