Darkness at Dawn: Early Suspense Classics by Cornell Woolrich

From 1934until his death in 1968, Cor­nell Woolrich wrote dozens of ?tales of love and despair� that chill the heart and display his mastery of the genre he all but created. In a title for a story he never wrote, he captured the essence of his tortured world: ?First you dream, then you die.�

 

Introducing these 13 tales, Nevins de­scribes the dark world Woolrich so viv­idly creates. ?The dominant reality in his world is the Depression, and Woolrich has no peers when it comes to describing a frightened little guy in a tiny apartment with no money, no job, a hun­gry wife and children, and anxiety eating him like a cancer. If a Woolrich protago­nist is in love, the beloved is likely to vanish in such a way that he not only canâ??t find her but canâ??t convince anyone she ever existed.â?