Rebecca

The narrator, a shy paid companion to the snobbish Mrs Van Hopper, meets the wealthy widower Maxim de Winter. They have a whirlwind romance. Maxim proposes — not with grand romance, but almost as an ultimatum ("Either you go to America with Mrs Van Hopper, or you come home to Manderley with me"). She says yes.

The narrator arrives at the grand estate and immediately feels out of place. Housekeeper Mrs Danvers is cold and hostile. Everyone — staff, visitors, even Maxim's sister Beatrice — keeps comparing her to the elegant, popular Rebecca, who supposedly drowned in a sailing accident.

The narrator's insecurity grows. Mrs Danvers manipulates her into wearing a costume identical to one Rebecca once wore to the Manderley Ball — which horrifies Maxim. Devastated and convinced her marriage has failed, the narrator nearly jumps from a window on Mrs Danvers's urging, but is interrupted by a shipwreck.

Divers find Rebecca's sunken boat — with her body still inside. Maxim confesses everything: Rebecca was cruel and unfaithful, and he shot her in a fit of rage. An inquest rules her death a suicide (deliberate holes were found in the boat). Rebecca's lover, Jack Favell, tries to prove murder but fails — it emerges Rebecca had terminal cancer, giving her a motive to provoke her own death. Mrs Danvers vanishes, and Manderley burns to the ground.