Child 44

Child 44 (published in 2008) is a thriller novel by British writer Tom Rob Smith. This is the first novel in a trilogy featuring former MGB Agent Leo Demidov, who investigates a series of gruesome child murders in Joseph Stalin's Soviet Union.

Themes

This novel, the first in a trilogy, takes inspiration from the crimes of Andrei Chikatilo (though he operated much later), also known as the Rostov Ripper, the Butcher of Rostov, and the Red Ripper, who was convicted of and executed for 52 murders in the Soviet Union. In addition to highlighting the problem of Soviet-era criminality in a state where "there is no crime", the novel explores the paranoia of the age, the education system, the secret police apparatus, orphanages, homosexuality in the USSR, and mental hospitals.

The second book in the trilogy, called The Secret Speech (April 2009) like its predecessor and successor, Agent 6 (published by Simon and Schuster in the UK in July 2011 and in the US in January 2012), features the character Leo Demidov and his wife, Raisa.

Child 44 (film)

Child 44 is a 2015 British-American mystery thriller film directed by Daniel Espinosa, written by Richard Price, and based on Tom Rob Smith's 2008 novel of the same name. The film stars Tom Hardy, Gary Oldman, Noomi Rapace, Joel Kinnaman, Paddy Considine, Jason Clarke, and Vincent Cassel. It was released on 17 April 2015 to mostly negative reviews, and bombed at the box office. The film appears very loosely based on the case of Andrei Chikatilo, the Soviet serial killer portrayed in the earlier film Citizen X.

Plot

A child is orphaned during the Holodomor in the Ukrainian S.S.R. in the early 1930s during Stalin's rule of the Soviet Union. He runs away from his orphanage and is taken in by Soviet soldiers. They give him the nickname "Leo", and with them he honours himself in battle and becomes a war hero.

In the early 1950s, Leo Demidov (Tom Hardy) is now a Ministry of State Security (MGB) Agent who uncovers a strange and brutal series of child murders. MGB leadership refuses to acknowledge the deaths as murders, because Soviet doctrine states that only capitalism produces serial murder. The son of Leo's partner is murdered by the serial killer and during Leo's investigation, his wife, Raisa (Noomi Rapace), is accused of being disloyal to the state. Leo suspects that his amoral and ambitious enemy in the MGB, Vasili Nikitin (Joel Kinnaman), is behind the charges. Leo refuses to support the accusation, and he is forced to take a demeaning militia position in the town of Volsk. Raisa accompanies him and must work as a janitor.

Child

Biologically, a child (plural: children) is a human between the stages of birth and puberty. The legal definition of child generally refers to a minor, otherwise known as a person younger than the age of majority.

Child may also describe a relationship with a parent (such as sons and daughters of any age) or, metaphorically, an authority figure, or signify group membership in a clan, tribe, or religion; it can also signify being strongly affected by a specific time, place, or circumstance, as in "a child of nature" or "a child of the Sixties".

There are many social issues that affect children, such as childhood education, bullying, child poverty, dysfunctional families, child labor, and in developing countries, hunger. Children can be raised by parents, by fosterers, guardians or partially raised in a day care center.

Legal, biological, and social definitions

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child defines child as "a human being below the age of 18 years unless under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier". This is ratified by 192 of 194 member countries. In U.S. Immigration Law, a child refers to anyone who is under the age of 21.

Child (magazine)

Child is a discontinued American parenting magazine founded by Jackie Leo and MaryAnn Sommers in 1986 and published through 2007. It was originally backed by Italian publishers, then sold to The New York Times Magazine Group which published it until 1995 along with its other women’s magazines, including Family Circle, before selling the titles to Gruner + Jahr. The Meredith Corporation acquired the Gruner & Jahr group in 2005.

While Child was originally aimed at sophisticated, dual-career parents, from 1995-2000, when Gruner & Jahr U.S.A. first purchased it, the magazine became a practical mass service magazine. In February 2000, Miriam Arond became Editor in Chief and relaunched Child as a lifestyle magazine for (as the tagline said) "Raising Kids With Smarts & Style." With beautiful, striking visuals, and newsworthy, trendspotting content, Child doubled its advertising pages from under 500 ad pages in 2000 to over 1,000 ad pages in 2005. The magazine won over 35 editorial and design awards. Its award-winning content included exclusive, data-driven surveys, like "The 10 Best Children's Hospitals," topical feature investigations like "Crisis in the ER", essays by acclaimed writers like Susan Cheever, Anne Rice, Anne Roiphe, Neal Pollack, A.J. Jacobs, and Rosanne Cash, and Child's Best Children's Book Awards.

Child (disambiguation)

A child is a person who is not yet an adult.

Child or The Child may also refer to:

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Music

Film and television