Kidnapped – Robert Louis Stevenson

"I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree."

Young David Balfour is betrayed by his uncle, kidnapped, and put on a ship bound for the Carolinas to be sold into slavery. He is rescued by the Jacobite soldier Alan Breck Stewart. Together, they flee across the Scottish Highlands, dodging redcoat soldiers and surviving shipwrecks in a thrilling chase to regain David's inheritance.

Stevenson's historical adventure is a classic of the genre. It is celebrated for its vivid depiction of 18th-century Scotland and the complex, developing friendship between the prudent Whig David and the reckless Highlander Alan.