It looks like one of the two male leads for Stephenie Meyer’s The Host has been found as Jake Abel gets ready to terrorize an alien… before he falls in love with her.

Abel, who recently appeared in Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief and I Am Number Four, might be getting ready for another book-to-movie adaptation in The Host as Ian, a guy that brutalizes an alien known as Wanderer that’s inhabiting the body of Melanie. While he and Wanderer don’t exactly start things off on the best of terms, Ian eventually falls in love with her. Unfortunately, love doesn’t always equal a happy ending because the alien he’s fallen for is in the body of a woman that has a boyfriend of her own. Yeah, talk about awkward.

While Abel hasn’t committed to the role yet, Deadline reports that negotiations are expected to begin soon and there’s really no reason to think talks will break down. While he has hooked up with a few mainstream franchises, Abel is still a small fish in a big pond and hooking up with The Host would be a definite smart move. After all, Meyer created the blockbuster Twilight series so who wouldn’t want her name on their resume?

If things go well, Abel will be joining a cast that already includes Saoirse Ronan (The Lovely Bones) as Melanie, the woman that becomes the initially unwilling vessel of an alien invader before they form an unlikely alliance. The other male lead, Melanie’s boyfriend Jared, hasn’t been chosen yet but the frontrunners for the part are Liam Hemsworth (The Hunger Games), Max Irons (Red Riding Hood), Kit Harington (Game of Thrones), and Jai Courtney (Spartacus: Blood and Sand).

The Host, based on Stephenie Meyer’s novel of the same name, is being directed by Andrew Niccol. Production on the film is expected to begin soon.

I haven’t read The Host so can’t really weigh in on the casting choice. What do you think of Abel as Ian?