Held Hostage


Book Description

Recounts the kidnapping of bank vice president Michelle Renee and her young daughter who were taped with explosives and given orders to rob Michelle's own bank or be killed, but the authorities suspected Michelle as orchestrating the crime.




A Mother Held Hostage


Book Description

This book is for those who know they don’t have it all together; life is crazy, difficult, disappointing, and sometimes downright impossible. It is for mothers and caretakers of special needs children who struggle with doubts, guilt, and crushed dreams. I survived, and you can too!




One Day Closer


Book Description

An instant national bestseller and "a beautiful story of what love can do to conquer the impossible" (Jann Arden). On the day my daughter was kidnapped by outlaws in Somalia, my life split into two parts: Before and After. This is the story of both parts, and of how I fought to bring my daughter home. On August 23, 2008, Amanda Lindhout, Lorinda Stewart’s daughter, is kidnapped outside of Mogadishu in Somalia. The kidnappers’ demand is simple: pay $2.5 million or Amanda will be killed. For the next 460 days, Lorinda does everything in her power—and beyond—to get her daughter back alive. This brave, small-town mother with no experience in hostage negotiations is called upon by the RCMP to be the lead communicator with Adam, the Somali who identifies himself as the English-speaking negotiator for Amanda's kidnappers. In a secret “war room” in Sylvan Lake, Alberta, Lorinda joins forces with federal officers and begins to answer calls from Adam, establishing a fragile rapport of trust with the man who holds her daughter’s fate in his hands. She learns how to demand POLs—proofs of life—from Amanda’s hostage takers and even how to react to “bad calls”—when she is forced to listen to her daughter’s desperate cries for help, fearing she is being abused and tortured. What’s supposed to be a short negotiation stretches on, and weeks become months. Lorinda finds herself increasingly on her own as negotiations break down. But she never gives up hope, even as the conversations become more traumatic. Faced with the terrible possibility of her daughter’s death, she decides to take control, bringing in private hostage negotiators and fundraising ransom money from donors. But will it be enough? This is the true story of one woman’s heroic perseverance in the face of despair, and of the hope and healing to be found beyond trauma. It is also, in the end, a tribute to the extraordinary power of a mother’s love.




Hostage Three


Book Description

A taut, emotionally loaded, devastatingly powerful thriller from the acclaimed, Carnegie-longlisted author of In Darkness and Blood Ninja.




Mother Had a Secret


Book Description

Tiffany recounts the challenges of growing up in the care of her mother who was diagnosed with dissociative identity disorder (DID), a condition that produces multiple "personalities" in victims of profound trauma.




The Weight of Sand


Book Description

A radiant, unforgettable memoir of one woman’s 450 days spent in captivity, and her defiant refusal to have her humanity stripped away. When Edith meets Luca in a small Northern town, the two connect instantly. Under the Northern Lights, they develop a deep friendship over their shared passions: travel, living off the land, a bohemian life. In search of wanderlust, they embark on an epic road trip from Italy to Togo, where they will join their friend’s sustainable farming project. Upon arriving on the African continent, they change their itinerary and drive through Africa’s Sahel region, a haven for militant groups, where they are surrounded and captured. Little was known about Edith’s and Luca’s fate until they reappeared in Mali more than one year later, having mysteriously escaped their captors. Now, Edith shares her harrowing story with the world for the first time—complete with the poems that became a lifeline for her in captivity, which she wrote in secret with a pen borrowed from another hostage. Against the stunning but cruel backdrop of the desert, Edith recounts her months as a hostage: the oppressive heat, violent sandstorms, constant relocations, hunger strikes, and her eventual heart-pounding escape. Separated from Luca early on, she finds solidarity and comfort with a group of other female hostages, who lend her a pen to write poetry, a creative outlet that helps save her life. Edith is steadfast in her will to remain sane: she reveals her dedication to her art, and her striking ability to unsettle her captors and identify their vulnerabilities. A compelling descent into a strange, brutal universe, The Weight of Sand is ultimately a life-affirming book and a poetic celebration of one woman’s resilience.




Mothers on Trial


Book Description

Updated and revised with seven new chapters, a new introduction, and a new resources section, this landmark book is invaluable for women facing a custody battle. It was the first to break the myth that mothers receive preferential treatment over fathers in custody disputes. Although mothers generally retain custody when fathers choose not to fight for it, fathers who seek custody often win—not because the mother is unfit or the father has been the primary caregiver but because, as Phyllis Chesler argues, women are held to a much higher standard of parenting. Incorporating findings from years of research, hundreds of interviews, and international surveys about child-custody arrangements, Chesler argues for new guidelines to resolve custody disputes and to prevent the continued oppression of mothers in custody situations. This book provides a philosophical and psychological perspective as well as practical advice from one of the country’s leading matrimonial lawyers. Both an indictment of a discriminatory system and a call to action over motherhood under siege, Mothers on Trial is essential reading for anyone concerned either personally or professionally with custody rights and the well-being of the children involved.




Hope


Book Description

The #1 New York Times Bestseller A bestselling book that is inspiring the nation: “We have written here about terrible things that we never wanted to think about again . . . Now we want the world to know: we survived, we are free, we love life.” Two women kidnapped by infamous Cleveland school-bus driver Ariel Castro share the stories of their abductions, captivity, and dramatic escape On May 6, 2013, Amanda Berry made headlines around the world when she fled a Cleveland home and called 911, saying: “Help me, I’m Amanda Berry. . . . I’ve been kidnapped, and I’ve been missing for ten years.” A horrifying story rapidly unfolded. Ariel Castro, a local school bus driver, had separately lured Berry, Gina DeJesus, and Michelle Knight to his home, where he kept them chained. In the decade that followed, the three were raped, psychologically abused, and threatened with death. Berry had a daughter—Jocelyn—by their captor. Drawing upon their recollections and the diary kept by Amanda Berry, Berry and Gina DeJesus describe a tale of unimaginable torment, and Pulitzer Prize–winning Washington Post reporters Mary Jordan and Kevin Sullivan interweave the events within Castro’s house with original reporting on efforts to find the missing girls. The full story behind the headlines—including details never previously released on Castro’s life and motivations—Hope is a harrowing yet inspiring chronicle of two women whose courage, ingenuity, and resourcefulness ultimately delivered them back to their lives and families.




Hostage


Book Description

"Feels like a blockbuster movie."—Lisa Jewell, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Then She Was Gone "Mackintosh is a pro...the final scene in the book almost made me sick as I read it. I mean that as a compliment of the highest order."—The New York Times You can save hundreds of lives. Or the one that matters most... From New York Times bestselling author Clare Mackintosh comes a claustrophobic thriller set over 20 hours on-board the inaugural nonstop flight from London to Sydney. Mina is trying to focus on her job as a flight attendant, not the problems with her five-year-old daughter back home, or the fissures in her marriage. But the plane has barely taken off when Mina receives a chilling note from an anonymous passenger, someone intent on ensuring the plane never reaches its destination: "The following instructions will save your daughter's life..." Someone needs Mina's assistance and knows exactly how to make her comply. When one passenger is killed and then another, Mina knows she must act. But which lives does she save: Her passengers...or her own daughter and husband who are in grave distress back at home? It's twenty hours to landing. A lot can happen in twenty hours. For fans of the locked-room mystery of One by One and the heart-stopping tension The Last Flight, Hostage is an explosively addictive thriller about one flight attendant and the agonizing decision that will change her life—and the lives of everyone on-board—forever. Praise for Hostage: "A banger of a book with a truly agonizing 'what would you do?'" —Ruth Ware, #1 New York Times bestselling author of One by One "Hypnotically good. Should be a hit, could be a classic..." —Lee Child, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Jack Reacher series "Fiendishly clever." —Lisa Gardner, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Before She Disappeared "A propulsive read." —Karin Slaughter, New York Times bestselling author of The Silent Wife "A nail-biter of a thriller." —Shari Lapena, New York Times bestselling author of The Couple Next Door




Children Held Hostage


Book Description

Demonstrating that children can and are being used by parents in the divorce battle, Children Held Hostage is based on in-depth research involving over 1,000 families. The authors show how parents' negative actions show up in court proceedings where children testify or are questioned by mental health professionals. They address the problem of programmed and brainwashed children by explaining how to identify a child alienated by one parent against the other, prove it in court, and then find a solution that works and that a court will buy into.