Kidnapped

Few crimes capture our imagination as completely as child kidnapping. Paula S. Fass explores how our awareness of violence toward the young has evolved from a time when Americans were shocked to discover that their children could be held for ransom, until today, when sexual predators seem to threaten our children at every turn. In a series of riveting narratives, Kidnapped shows how child abduction is entangled with cultural issues - parenting and the American family, the media and our fascination eith celebrity, gender and sexuality, mental health, and much more. By tracing the most infamous kidnapping cases of the past 125 year, Fass peers into the American mind, providing new insights into a society that both values and exploits its youngest members.