Old Nick is found and faces numerous charges of abduction, rape, and child endangerment that will likely lead to 25 years to life in prison. The two are taken to a mental hospital, where they receive medical evaluations and a temporary home. In spite of his inability to communicate effectively, Jack describes the route to Room to an officer to free Ma.

Jack escapes Old Nick and manages to reach a friendly stranger who contacts the police. Old Nick removes Jack, wrapped in a rug, from Room. When Old Nick refuses to take Jack to a hospital, Ma then pretends that Jack has died. Jack is unable to conceptualize being outside of Room or interacting with other people, but Ma eventually convinces him to help her. Feeling certain that Old Nick would kill them both before letting them free, Ma comes up with a plan to get Jack out of Room by convincing Old Nick that Jack is deathly ill. Old Nick regularly rapes Ma Jack is the product of one such sexual assault.Ī week after Jack's fifth birthday, Ma learns Old Nick has been unemployed for the past six months and is in danger of losing his home to foreclosure. Jack is unaware that Old Nick kidnapped Ma when she was 19 years old and has kept her imprisoned for the past seven years. Old Nick brings them food and necessities. The only other person Jack has ever seen is 'Old Nick,' who visits Room at night while Jack sleeps hidden in a wardrobe. Ma tries her best to keep Jack healthy and happy via both physical and mental exercises, keeping a healthy diet, limiting TV-watching time, and strict body and oral hygiene. Because it is all he has ever known, Jack believes that only Room and the things it contains (including himself and Ma) are 'real.' Ma, unwilling to disappoint Jack with a life she cannot give him, allows Jack to believe that the rest of the world exists only on television. The film was a critical and commercial success it received four nominations at the 88th Academy Awards including for Best Picture, and won Best Actress for Larson.įive-year old Jack lives with his 27-year old Ma in 'Room', a secured single-room outbuilding containing a small kitchen, a basic bathroom, a wardrobe, a bed, and a TV set.

The film adaptation, also titled Room, was released in October 2015, starring Brie Larson and Jacob Tremblay. It was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 2010, and was shortlisted for the 2010 Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize and the 2010 Governor General's Awards. The novel was longlisted for the 2011 Orange Prize and won the 2011 Commonwealth Writers' Prize regional prize (Caribbean and Canada). Donoghue conceived the story after hearing about five-year-old Felix in the Fritzl case.

The story is told from the perspective of a five-year-old boy, Jack, who is being held captive in a small room along with his mother. Room is a 2010 novel by Irish-Canadian author Emma Donoghue.

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