The source for Douglas Sirk's 1955 film of the same name, Edna Lee's fine novel written in collaboration with her son was first published in the Woman's Home companion in the November and December issues of 1951. Locking the reader inside the experiences of its widowed protagonist as she struggles to escape the constraints of her comfortable middle-class existence, its is a sharply observed, psychologically astute account of the complacency of 1950s America and the dangers concealed behind its placid surfaces.