Robert Hough's The Stowaway Optioned for Film

Canadian author Robert Hough's The Stowaway, a modern day tale of mutiny on the high seas which was hailed by The Boston Globe as "masterful" and described by the National Post as "a rare and powerful example of human decency triumphing over amoral self interest," has been optioned for film by First Generation Films, a production company based in Los Angeles and Toronto. Currently, First Generation is completing The Whistleblower, a drama about the Eastern European sex trafficking industry, for HBO Films. Other projects include White and Rice, Amreeka, and the Emmy-winning Miracle Mile.

The Stowaway tells the true-life story of the Maersk Dubai, a container ship in which three Romanian stowaways are found, and then put overboard by the ship's officers. When the crew find a fourth stowaway, they attempt to hide him, and keep him alive until they can somehow get help. Says producer Christina Piovesan, "I'm compelled to tell this story because it has international scope, deep social relevance and it explores riveting moral questions that speak to the very heart of what it means to be human. It will make for dramatic, captivating cinema."

The film deal was arranged by Debbie Wood of Westwood Creative Artists. Hough's literary agent is Jackie Kaiser. The Stowaway, which was a Boston Globe Top Ten Book of 2004 and a 2006 IMPAC Dublin Literary Award Finalist, is published in Canada by Random House Canada and in the US by Arcade. Robert Hough is also the author of The Final Confession of Mabel Stark, film rights to which are held by the Oscar winning UK filmmaker Sam Mendes, and The Culprits. The Culprits, his latest book, published by Random House Canada, was shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best Book and nominated for The Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize.