The Thirty-Nine Steps

Book excerpt: Famous as the basis for several films, including the brilliant 1935 version directed by Alfred Hitchcock, The Thirty-Nine Steps is a classic of early twentieth-century popular literature. Richard Hannay has just returned to England after years in South Africa and is thoroughly bored with his life in London. But then a murder is committed in his flat, just days after a chance encounter with an American who had told him about an assassination plot that could have dire international consequences. An obvious suspect for the police and an easy target for the killers, Hannay goes on the run in his native Scotland where he will need all his courage and ingenuity to stay one step ahead of his pursuers.