The Stepford Wives

Joanna Eberhart is a young photographer whose work is starting to earn her a name. She moves from New York City to Stepford, a quiet suburb in Connecticut, with her husband Walter and their two children, hoping for a calmer life.

The calm comes with a puzzle. The women of Stepford keep spotless homes, give themselves over to housework, and seem oddly blank. Joanna has few friends in town who share her outlook, and Bobbie is one of them.

Then Walter joins the Men's Association. Joanna's friends begin to change, one by one. She starts digging into the town's past and learns that many of the wives were once activists and professionals, which turns her unease into a suspicion about what the men are doing.

First published in 1972, this short novel is a satire of suburban domesticity and of the backlash against the women's movement, told as a taut thriller. Its title gave English the phrase "Stepford wife", and it was filmed in 1975 and again in 2004. Reading it means watching one woman's doubt close in on her.