 First edition cover art | |
| Author | Lois Duncan |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Genre | |
| Publisher | Doubleday |
| Pages | 172 |
| OCLC | 1286149 |
| LC Class | 66013196 |
Ransom (reprinted under the title Five Were Missing) [1] is a 1966 thriller novel by Lois Duncan. [2] [3] Its plot follows a group of children who are kidnapped and held hostage on a school bus. It marked Duncan's first foray into the suspense and thriller genre, and was nominated for an Edgar Allan Poe Award. [4]
Marianne Paget, Bruce Kirtland, Glenn Kirtland, Jesse French, and Dexter Barton, students in Albuquerque, New Mexico, are abducted on their school bus by a gang of kidnappers. The criminals demand $15,000 ransoms for each child, which their respective parents scramble to produce. Meanwhile, the five youths attempt to find a way to escape the situation themselves.
On March 1, 1932, Charles Augustus Lindbergh Jr., the 20-month-old son of colonel Charles Lindbergh and his wife, aviatrix and author Anne Morrow Lindbergh, was murdered after being abducted from his crib in the upper floor of the Lindberghs' home, Highfields, in East Amwell, New Jersey, United States. On May 12, the child's corpse was discovered by a truck driver by the side of a nearby road.
Edgar Meyer is an American bassist and composer. His styles include classical, bluegrass, newgrass, and jazz. He has won seven Grammy Awards and been nominated ten times.
Killing Mr. Griffin is a 1978 suspense novel by Lois Duncan about a group of teenaged students at a New Mexico high school, who plan to kidnap their strict English teacher, Mr. Griffin. Duncan developed the story from the character of Mark, who is involved in the kidnapping plan and is based on the first boyfriend of Duncan's oldest daughter. Mr. Griffin was based on the personality of a teacher one of Duncan's daughters had in high school. In 2010, the novel was reissued with changes to modernize the content, making it more age appropriate and appealing to readers.
Harlan Coben is an American writer of mystery novels and thrillers. The plots of his novels often involve the resurfacing of unresolved or misinterpreted events in the past, murders, or fatal accidents and have multiple twists. Twelve of his novels have been adapted for film and television.
Ransom is a 1996 American action thriller film directed by Ron Howard from a screenplay by Richard Price and Alexander Ignon. The film stars Mel Gibson, Rene Russo, Gary Sinise, Delroy Lindo, Lili Taylor, Brawley Nolte, Liev Schreiber, Donnie Wahlberg and Evan Handler. Gibson was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor. The film was the 5th highest-grossing film of 1996 in the United States. The original story came from a 1954 episode of The United States Steel Hour titled "Fearful Decision". In 1956, it was adapted by Cyril Hume and Richard Maibaum into the feature film, Ransom!, starring Glenn Ford, Donna Reed, and Leslie Nielsen.
Proof of Life is a 2000 American action thriller film directed and produced by Taylor Hackford, and starring Meg Ryan and Russell Crowe. The title refers to a phrase commonly used to indicate proof that a kidnap victim is still alive. The film's screenplay was written by Tony Gilroy, who also was an executive producer, and was inspired by William Prochnau's Vanity Fair magazine article "Adventures in the Ransom Trade", and Thomas Hargrove's book Long March to Freedom, in which Hargrove recounts how his release was negotiated by Thomas Clayton, who went on to be the founder of kidnap-for-ransom consultancy Clayton Consultants, Inc.
Karin Alvtegen is a Swedish author of crime fiction. Alvtegen's psychological thrillers are generally set in Sweden. Four of her books have been translated into English: Missing, Betrayal, Shadow and Shame.
Lois Duncan Steinmetz, known as Lois Duncan, was an American writer, novelist, poet, and journalist. She is best known for her young-adult novels, and has been credited by historians as a pioneering figure in the development of young-adult fiction, particularly in the genres of horror, thriller, and suspense.
Locked in Time is a 1985 suspense novel by Lois Duncan. The story centers around Nore, a seventeen-year-old girl who moves into a new home with her father and her new stepfamily. Soon after she meets her stepmother, stepbrother, and stepsister for the first time, Nore begins to suspect something is not quite right about her stepfamily. The author states that the novel explores some of the issues surrounding having eternal life. Duncan says she developed the idea for the novel when one of her daughters was thirteen years old and was having issues with her body image. Duncan mentions that her daughter was "taking everything out" on her, and she began to wonder what it would be like if her daughter never outgrew her adolescence.
Ransom is the practice of holding a prisoner to extort money or property to secure their release, or it can refer to the sum of money involved.
Held for Ransom is a 2000 direct-to-video thriller film starring Dennis Hopper, Zachery Ty Bryan, Morgan Fairchild and Debi Mazar. It was directed and written by Lee Stanley based on the novel by Lois Duncan.
Along Came a Spider is a 2001 American neo-noir psychological thriller film directed by Lee Tamahori. It is the second installment in the Alex Cross film series and a sequel to the 1997 film Kiss the Girls, with Morgan Freeman and Jay O. Sanders reprising their roles as detective Alex Cross and FBI-agent Kyle Craig. The screenplay by Marc Moss was adapted from the 1993 novel of the same title by James Patterson, but many of the key plot elements of the book were eliminated. The film was a box office success, despite receiving mixed-to-negative reviews from critics like its predecessor.
Weekend of Terror is a 1970 American made-for-television thriller film directed by Jud Taylor and starring Robert Conrad, Carol Lynley, Lois Nettleton and Jane Wyatt. It was aired on December 8, 1970, in the ABC Movie of the Week space.
Maanagaram (transl. Metropolis) is a 2017 Indian Tamil-language action thriller film co-written and directed by Lokesh Kanagaraj, and produced by S. R. Prabhu. The film stars Sri, Sundeep Kishan, and Regina Cassandra, and its soundtrack was composed by Javed Riaz. It is the feature directorial debut of Lokesh Kanagaraj. The film was released on 10 March 2017 to positive reviews from critics. It was remade in Hindi as Mumbaikar (2023).
Owen Matthew Sellers Laukkanen is a Canadian mystery writer, the creator of the Stevens and Windermere series, among other novels. His first novel, The Professionals, was a finalist for the Anthony Award for Best First Novel at Bouchercon 2013, the annual World Mystery Convention. It was also listed as one of the top 100 novels of 2012 by Kirkus Reviews. Laukkanen lives in Vancouver, British Columbia.
The Twisted Window is a 1987 suspense novel by Lois Duncan. It is about Tracy, a high school student who agrees to help someone find his missing stepsister, who he says was kidnapped by his stepfather.
They Never Came Home is a 1968 mystery-thriller novel by Lois Duncan. The novel was nominated for an Edgar Allan Poe Award.
Game of Danger is a 1962 thriller novel by Lois Duncan.
The Chain is a 2019 novel written by Adrian McKinty.
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