Daphne du Maurier, born May 13, 1907, was a master of a writing technique called suspense. Suspense is the feeling of not knowing what will happen next. Instead of showing readers a scary creature right away, du Maurier made them wait. In her short story The Birds, a farmer notices that birds are acting strangely. They gather in unusual numbers. Then they attack. Du Maurier never explains why the birds attack, and that mystery makes the story even scarier. The reader's imagination fills in the blanks with something worse than any explanation could provide. Du Maurier grew up in a family of artists. Her father was a famous actor, and her grandfather was an illustrator who drew pictures for magazines. She began writing novels in her twenties. Her most famous book, Rebecca, starts with one of the most recognized opening lines in English literature: "Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again." Alfred Hitchcock, the famous movie director, turned both Rebecca and The Birds into films. Du Maurier was not always happy with the adaptations, but the movies made her stories known around the world.