Scientist wows Hollywood with novel written between shifts in hospital lab

A London scientist who wrote a novel in his spare time is set to become the toast of Hollywood.

Steve Watson, a specialist in audiology, wrote the psychological thriller between shifts at St Thomas' Hospital.

Now the 39-year-old's book, Before I Go To Sleep, is to be made into a film, with Kate Winslet, Cate Blanchett or Angelina Jolie being suggested for the lead.

Sir Ridley Scott and Tony Scott, who have a string of box-office hits between them such as Alien and Top Gun, describe the project as "really exciting".

Watson, who writes under the name SJ Watson, said today: "It's quite difficult for me to get my head round all this. Any writer dreams of being published. I had this fantasy that someone would make a film, but never dreamt it would come true."

The rights to the novel were acquired in June by publishers in 32 countries from Brazil to Vietnam. In Britain, Transworld, which publishes Dan Brown and Terry Pratchett, won against 11 publishers after he first sent out the manuscript in January.

It tells the story of a woman who wakes up to discover that rather than being young, free and single she's married to the stranger next to her in bed and her body has aged beyond recognition.

It is partly inspired by actual amnesia cases as well as Watson's own experiences of patients with memory defects.

Liza Marshall, the film's producer for Scott Free UK, says it is a "brilliant" thriller and "a meditation on love, loss and what it means to be alive".

After 20 pages, she wanted the book, and the Scotts decided last month that they wanted to make it into a film. Bafta-winner Rowan Joffé will write and direct it, with the Scotts as executive producers.

Watson, who is originally from Stourbridge, had a love of reading instilled in him by his mother. But after studying physics at Birmingham University, he became a clinical scientist in audiology.

Realising that a full-time senior position was leaving him "mentally exhausted", he decided to take a more junior, part-time position and enrolled for a course on writing a novel, where he met Clare Conville, a leading literary agent who was teaching a seminar. "He's a brilliant writer," she said. Selina Walker, who acquired the book for Transworld, could not believe it was a first novel. She describes it as a literary crime novel.

Watson, who is taking a two-year break from medicine to write a second novel, said: "For me, success will be the day when I'm out and about on the Tube and see someone reading my book."