A Stranger in My Grave

Description

Jim and Daisy Harker are a young, well-to-do Californian couple, and though childless they maintain the sort of domestic happiness that others can only aspire to. But a darkness exists at the outer edges of Daisy's mind and she has no idea why it's there. In a series of recurring nightmares she wanders a cemetery, eventually finding her own gravestone. According to the dream, December 2nd, 1955 is the day she died. Street smart but honorable, Stevens Pinata is a man with his own mysteries. An orphan left on a church doorstep as a child, he's now a private investigator working with bail bonds and quick shakedowns. But when a pretty young woman like Daisy Harker comes into his office with a crazy request to 'find her lost day' he is intrigued. He is too decent to take advantage of a crazy woman, but Mr. Harker is a wealthy man and who is Pinata to turn down money? What unfolds is a masterpiece of suspense and one of the books that forever changed the domestic thriller. Millar's razor sharp prose cuts a masterful plot and slashes at the racism, sexism, and entitlement endemic to an era otherwise celebrated for its prosperity.

Margaret Millar (1915-1994) was the author of 27 books and a masterful pioneer of psychological mysteries and thrillers. Born in Kitchener, Ontario, she spent most of her life in Santa Barbara, California. Her 1956 novel Beast in View won the Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Novel. In 1965 Millar was the recipient of the Los Angeles Times Woman of the Year Award and in 1983 the Mystery Writers of America awarded her the Grand Master Award for Lifetime Achievement.