Danny DeVito will direct a film adaptation of the best-selling young adult novel "The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle".

Saoirse Ronan ("Atonement," "City of Ember") will play a daring girl who makes a transatlantic crossing in the 1830s from England to America, and finds herself caught between a ruthless captain and a mutinous crew.

Morgan Freeman and Pierce Brosnan also star in the project which DeVito adapted from the 1990 book by Edward 'Avi' Irving Wortis. Shooting will begin in September for release next year.