Hostage!: Kidnapping and Terrorism in Our Time

School Library Journal

Gr 7-10-- Taylor attempts to give an overview of the various types of hostage-takings. He opens with the Achille Lauro incident and then moves on to incidents in Lebanon, South America, and the U. S. in order to establish a historical perspective. There are chapters that deal with the emotions of victims, negotiating techniques, and the role of the media. While this volume is far from an exhaustive study, it is an adequate overview of a problem that has refused to go away. The close link between hostage-taking and international terrorist groups is better dealt with in Think About Terrorism, the New Warfare (Walker, 1988) by Terrell E. Arnold and Moorhead Kennedy. While Hostage! is short on analysis, it is a fine basis upon which to build a term paper or just a good working knowledge of international terrorist kidnapping. There are a few black-and-white illustrations; however, they seem to provide little more than an occasional break in the text. --Steve Matthews, Foxcroft School, Middleburg, VA