Alice Hale's life is falling apart. Or at least that's what it feels like to Alice, cooped up in the newly purchased suburban fixer-upper she reluctantly agreed to rehab with her husband. The house is only a few miles from Alice's beloved former home, New York City, but for all the eerie quietness of her street, the 1950s decor and appliances, and the empty hours filling her days after a quick and dramatic departure from her PR career, it might as well be another world. Nellie Murdoch, the house's former occupant, was navigating two worlds as well. There's the image that her friends saw, the perfect Nellie who always had the best dish at the potluck, a serene smile on her face, and the most beautiful garden in town. But then there was the reality inside her house - a much darker place than any of her neighbors could imagine. When Alice finds one of Nellie's old cookbooks abandoned in the house's basement, she becomes fascinated with Nellie's 1950s life. Soon Alice learns that while Baked Alaska and meatloaf five ways might seem harmless, Nellie's secrets were anything but. Upon discovering a more sinister, even dangerous side of Nellie's marriage, Alice begins to take control of her life and protect herself with a few secrets of her own.