{"product_id":"kidnapped-9780553212600","title":"Kidnapped","description":"\u003cb\u003eAcclaimed by Henry James as Robert Louis Stevenson's best novel, \u003ci\u003eKidnapped \u003c\/i\u003eachieves what Stevenson called, \"the particular crown and triumph of the artist...not simply to convince, but to enchant.\"\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eSpirited, romantic, and full of danger, \u003ci\u003eKidnapped \u003c\/i\u003eis Robert Louis Stevenson's classic of high adventure. Beloved by generations, it is the saga of David Balfour, a young heir whose greedy uncle connives to do him out of his inherited fortune and plots to have him seized and sold into slavery. But honor, loyalty, and courage are rewarded; the orphan and castaway survives kidnapping and shipwreck, is rescued by a daredevil of a rogue, and makes a thrilling escape to freedom across the wild highlands of Scotland.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThroughout his life, Robert Louis Balfour Stevenson was tormented by poor health. Yet despite frequent physical collapses-mainly due to constant respiratory illness-he was an indefatigable writer of novels, poems, essays, letters, travel books, and children's books. He was born on November 13, 1850, in Edinburgh, of a prosperous family of lighthouse engineers. Though he was expected to enter the family profession, he studied instead for the Scottish bar. By the time he was called to the bar, however, he had already begun writing seriously, and he never actually practiced law. In 1880, against his family's wishes, he married an American divorc?e, Fanny Vandegrift Osbourne, who was ten years his senior; but the family was soon reconciled to the match, and the marriage proved a happy one. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eAll his life Stevenson traveled-often in a desperate quest for health. He and Fanny, having married in California and spent their honeymoon by an abandoned silver mine, traveled back to Scotland, then to Switzerland, to the South of France, to the American Adirondacks, and finally to the south of France, to the South Seas. As a novelist he was intrigued with the genius of place: \u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e\u003cb\u003eTreasure Island\u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003e(1883) began as a map to amuse a boy. Indeed, all his works reveal a profound sense of landscape and atmosphere: \u003cb\u003eKidnapped\u003c\/b\u003e (1886); \u003cb\u003eThe Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde\u003c\/b\u003e (1886); \u003ci\u003eThe Master of Ballantrae\u003c\/i\u003e (1889). \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eIn 1889 Stevenson's deteriorating health exiled him to the tropics, and he settled in Samoa, where he was given patriarchal status by the natives. His health improved, yet he remained homesick for Scotland, and it was to the \"cold old huddle of grey hills\" of the Lowlands that he returned in his last, unfinished masterpiece, \u003ci\u003e Weir of Hermiston\u003c\/i\u003e (1896). \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eStevenson dies suddenly on December 3, 1894, not of the long-feared tuberculosis, but of a cerebral hemorrhage. The kindly author of \u003cb\u003eJekyll and Hyde\u003c\/b\u003e went down to the cellar to fetch a bottle of his favorite burgundy, uncorked it in the kitchen, abruptly cried out to his wife, \"What's the matter with me, what is this strangeness, \u003ci\u003ehas my face changed\u003c\/i\u003e?\"-and fell to the floor. The brilliant storyteller and master of transformations had been struck down at forty-four, at the height of his creative powers.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Bantam Classics","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50613600387346,"sku":"9780553212600","price":4.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_0cd3dd5e-0b1d-491f-9db4-5fbcb608c2fb.jpg?v=1748523039","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/kidnapped-9780553212600","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}