Wouldn’t it be great to be a novelist whose story rights get picked up by Hollywood before the book is even released? Of course it would. It guarantees millions of dollars in your pocket regardless of whether or not your book sucks. Well, this is the life Stephen King is leading as director Jonathan Demme has already snatched up the rights to King’s next anxiously awaited novel, 11/22/63.

Demme’s name might not have the strength it used to, but he has steadily delivered knockout hits like his most recent success Rachel Getting Married, and Oscar winners Philadelphia and the still amazing Silence of the Lambs. 11/22/63 will have the director making his first major foray into the science fiction category, following a 35-year-old English teacher, named Jack Epping, back in time where he attempts to prevent the assassination of John F. Kennedy. That’s as much of the story as we’ve got so far, so we’re not sure just how heavily the book will lean on sci-fi throughout the story, or if it just ends with an accidental bit of time travel.

According to Variety, Demme hasn’t nailed down a distributor just yet, though with his name on the director’s chair and King in the executive producer slot, there shouldn’t be much trouble finding someone to put this out. However, Demme is leaving himself a little time to get these details ironed out before his projected start date of just over a year from now in the fall of 2012.

Demme isn’t like Spielberg. He’s not everywhere and isn’t involved with every movie under the sun. But when he pops up he consistently delivers high quality work and with Stephen King source material, 11/22/63 should be no exception.