What if you woke up to discover everyone thought you were somebody else?Pregnant and abandoned, all Helen Georgesson has is five dollars and a one-way ticket to San Francisco. Then she is involved in a train crash, and regains consciousness only to discover that she has given birth - and, in a bizarre twist of fate, has been mistaken for somebody else. Helen decides to claim this opportunity to make a new life for herself and her son. But eventually her past will catch up with her, in terrible ways...

Cornell Woolrich (1903-68) was one of the most admired and influential of all 20th century American crime writers. His work inspired many films, including most famously The Leopard Man, Phantom Lady, Rear Window, The Bride Wore Black, Mississippi Mermaid and Union City. He led a strange and often very unhappy life, latterly as a recluse in a Manhattan hotel.