Ira Levin's The Stepford Wives (set in Connecticut0 was much more to my taste. I saw the movie before I read the book and the virtual lobotomizing of the Paula Prentiss character scared the bejezus out of me. According to Wikipedia, Levin based the town of Stepford on Wilton, Connecticut, where he'd lived in the 60s. This is my favorite of Levin's books. I like it more than his most popular work, Rosemary's Baby.

Speare. It was written in 1958 and I don't think it's been out of print since. It was probably the first "historical novel" I ever read, and i loved the heroine Kit Tyler, a smart and independent young woman who triumphs in love and life. I loved that her full name was "Katherine," like mine. (I have a cousin Katherine who goes by Kit, which I always thought was sooooo cool.) I'm pretty sure that Witch was the gateway book that led me to the historical romances of Victoria Holt and Phyllis A. Whitney and Mary Stewart, which I devoured when I was a teenager. (And they in turn led me to historical mysteris and after that, there was no turning back.