Shirley Jackson: Hangsaman (Penguin Modern Classics)

'Natalie thought quickly, The danger is here, in here, just as they stepped inside and were lost in the darkness.' Natalie Waite, daughter of a mediocre writer and a neurotic housewife, is increasingly unsure of her place in the world. In the midst of adolescence she senses a creeping darkness in her life, which will spread among nightmarish parties, poisonous college cliques and the manipulations of the intellectual men who surround her, as her identity gradually crumbles. Inspired by the unsolved disappearance of a female college student near Shirley Jackson's home, Hangsaman is a story of lurking disquiet and haunting disorientation. 'A leader in the field of beautifully written, quiet, cumulative shudders.' Dorothy Parker