Kidnapped

First published as a serial in Young Folks between May and July 1886 and now reprinted in an Everyman edition on the centenary of Stevenson's death. Kidnapped is an adventure story that has become the model for any thriller of escape and suspense. Set in 1751, the flight of David Balfour and Alan Breck across the Highlands of Scotland is based on real events. Through he wrote the book to make money, while living as an invalid in Bournemouth. Stevenson was proud of it; he inscribed a presentation copy with the couplet. Here is the one sound page of all my writing. The one I'm proud of and that I delight in. Rowland Hilder is famous for his paintings of the English countryside but his work in book illustration covered a much wider canvas. His drawing for Kidnapped were first published in 1930 and have undesevedly, been long out of print.