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Binding: Audio Cassette
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9781567406184
Format: Audiobook
ISBN: 1567406181
Label: Unabridged Library Edition
Manufacturer: Unabridged Library Edition
Number Of Items: 8
Publication Date: 1998-11-01
Publisher: Unabridged Library Edition
Product Release Date: 1998-11-01
Studio: Unabridged Library Edition

"David, something awful has happened to your mother and father," said the stranger in the van. "You're in great danger. You've got to come with us..."

Nine-year-old David Stark has been snatched off the street in broad daylight. With no apparent motive. No witnesses. And only one clue-his shiny red bicycle, lying on the side of the road. Rachel and Stephen Stark are already uneasy partners in a troubled marriage. Now they grow further apart, and Rachel must summon all her strength and courage, every ounce of rage and terror and anguish, into the desperate search for David.

Katharine Clark has written a gripping novel of a family in crisis and created a plot that twists and turns at a breathless pace until its unforgettable conclusion.

Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Not worth the time or money
Review: A child is kidnapped. The mother is desperate to get her son back. She comes across as a ninny to me. The author tries hard to convey the emotions of her characters instead of letting the story tell it. The dialog seemed wrong at times and small mistakes in the flow of the story. I would never read a novel by Katherine Clark again. Stay away from Steal Away.

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Customer Rating:
Review Summary: A gripping Read and All Too Real
Review: I first read this book because I like the author's mysteries under her nom-de-plume (Kate Flora) long before I had kids of my own and like some reviewers dismissed the 'psychic' feelings of the main character Rachel as literary hooey and an elegant plot device. Now a parent of two-year-old twins, I find the same feelings within myself and, when re-reading it on a sunny afternoon while the twins played, found myself shuddering and staring at every strange van in our neighborhood. In her non-literary former day job, I'm certain Ms. Clark had been exposed to every sort of child trauma and tragedy and she writes about them with the compassion of an insider to the human drama that unfolds. As I write this, I am remided of the two Amber Alerts that were issued within the past week and how every parent needs to be aware. But aside from the reality of what she writes, I found myself turning pages wanting to see what happens next and if all would end well (as it usually does in fiction if not in real life).

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Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Every parent's nightmare come true...
Review: This book sure garnished mixed reviews! Some loved it while others hated it. I thought it was pretty well done. Not all of us are heros or heroines. Many women and some men are only forced to act on their lives only when confronted with situations out of their ability to control, such as one that arises in this book. A child is snatched by strangers, and the ability of those strangers to take that child is given by those who love that child the most. In WWI America they had these advertisements saying "Loose lips sink ships." The carelessness of an aunt, the lack of observation by parents at sports and dance situations, the lack of concern most people show for their neighbors and often their friends help lead to a child disappearing.

It is absolutely imperative that people understand that most children who are kidnapped are kidnapped by family or acquaintances. Stranger abductions like this are rare, but they still frighten parents and grandparents.

It is easy to judge the mother, Rachel, for being weak and bowing too much to her husband's whims. I've met women like this, but when confronted by problems, they often shine. They also learn things about themselves and about their families, their husbands that they chose to ignore. Rachel persists. She badgers, she shucks her life of all the unimportant societal standards in order to find her son.

My big problem with this book was not with the characterization. We are all different, and the author was portraying someone who had chosen to ignore the things that were wrong about her family and about her life. For the most part the plot was strong, but I thought the ending was curt. It left too much up in the air.

Karen Sadler

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Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Ugh!
Review: This is possibly the worst book I've ever read. I literally was skimming the pages 1/2 way through just to get to the conclusion. The female "heroine" is so weak kneed and pathetic it's amazing she can tie her shoelaces by herself not to mention track down her missing son! She kept complaining how everyone thought of and treated her as a crazy person and honey! if the loony bin fits...!

I realize this was a first book attempt and heaven knows I don't have the talent for writing but if you read this book just go in with eyes wide open.

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Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Infuriating "Heroine"
Review: This may be the most annoying book I've ever read. The main character, with whom the reader should at least sympathize, made my skin crawl. She represented every negative stereotype of women ever perpetrated. She is inept, ineffectual, irritating. She was so useless as a mother that I didn't care who kidnapped her son -- he'd be better off with anyone but her.

Her "poor pitiful me" demeanor, her delight in her own incompetence, her willingness to tolerate emotional abuse from her husband (abuse that, frankly, I wanted to inflict on her myself) made this reader hope that she would be done away with before the book's end.

I am amazed that a woman writer could and would create such a caricature of a character, much less hang a novel on an idiot like this.

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