THE QUEEN OF SUSPENSE Charlotte Armstrong (1905-1969) introduced suspense into the commonplace, the everyday, by writing short stories and novels in which one simple action sets a series of events spiraling into motion, pulling readers along, breathless with anxiety. By creating characters that could be one’s next-door-neighbors and by relocating suspense, in many cases, from its Gothic ancestral settings, to locales she knew best, Armstrong created what the mystery writer Jan Burke aptly named suburban noir. Armstrong’s small town Midwestern upbringing and adult life on both East and West coasts fine tuned her. Anthony Boucher observed of her work, “The method by which she achieves her magical effects defies critical analysis.”