Step in the Dark
1938 novel
Step in the Dark is a mystery thriller novel by the British writer Ethel Lina White, which was first published in 1938. It was published by the Collins Crime Club in London and Harper Brothers in New York.
Synopsis
Since her husband died heavily in debt, his young widow Georgia Yeo has lived on the Suffolk coast writing popular thriller novels to support her two young daughters. Overworked, she is persuaded by her publisher to take a holiday in Belgium. In Brussels she is swept off her feet by Gustav, a Swedish Count. Deeply in love she takes a step in the dark to marry this unknown stranger, accompanying him to the island he owns off the Swedish coast. Very soon she finds herself held a virtual prisoner by the Count and his associates, and tries to slip messages to her publisher and friends in England through the new novel she is writing.
References
Bibliography
Peacock, Scott. Contemporary Authors, Volume 167. Gale, 1998.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Step in the Dark” as 1938 novel. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the arts & letters register because the source frames it as 1938 novel. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q123253273. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1938 and 1998.
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This entry incorporates text from “Step in the Dark” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.