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A Mystery Scene Magazine 2021 Editor's Pick Trust No One. Especially Your Neighbors. Rachel Drake is on the run from the man who killed her husband. She never leaves her safe haven in an anonymous doorman building, until one night a phone call sends her running. On her way to the garage, she is murdered in the elevator. But her story doesn't end there. She finds herself in the afterlife, tethered to her death spot, her reach tied to the adjacent apartments. As she rides the elevator up and down, the lives of the residents intertwine. Every one of them has a dark secret. An aging trophy wife whose husband strays. A surgeon guarding a locked room. A TV medium who may be a fraud. An ordinary man with a mysterious hobby. Compelled to spend eternity observing her neighbors, she realizes that any one of them could be her killer.… (more)
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It appears that Rachel is tethered in the afterlife to the elevator in the building, constantly pulled from floor to floor and room to room watching the living. Each of the residents hides a secret, a wife who's husband strays from the marriage, a surgeon who has a locked room in her apartment where she lives along with her son, a man who has a hobby, looking at the apartments across the street with his telescope, a teenager who has an interest in the afterlife and the devil, and a medium who may not be who he says he is.
Each time she is pulled into an apartment, she is able to see more into her neighbors lives. She is also trying to figure out who killed her, her best friend Catalina who has temporarily moved into the building to try to figure out who killed her friend, with the help of Rachel's brother in law who has moved into Rachel's apartment with the explanation that he is there to try to figure out who killed Rachel. Rachel can't have contact with any of these people because she is, well she is dead.
I love a good ghost story and this one is right up there with the best. The writing is top notch and the plot is a new twist on a ghost story. This one kept me turning the pages. I loved it and highly recommend it!
I received the book for review purposes only.
The Ghosts Of Thorwald Place combines a murder investigation and a ghost story into a fascinating tale that examines clues in the physical and astral planes.
A man is murdered, and his widow is
Like the movie Rear Window, our protagonist is limited where she can go and how she can interact with the building’s residents. She’s trying to figure out who killed her while learning dark secrets about the residents and other ghosts inhabiting the Thorwald Place building. I loved the narration by the ghost, especially since the author gave her sensible limitations that kept me guessing. Unwrapping each resident’s secrets added a rich complexity to the tale.
The biggest test in a mystery is whether the resolution makes sense. Are the loose ends reasonably tied up? Is the killer(s) plausible based on the clues? Was the investigation interesting enough to keep my attention? In The Ghosts Of Thorwald Place, the answer is a resounding yes.
The book is not for the faint of heart. The trigger warnings at the top of this review must be respected. The secrets of Thorwald Place are warped enough to make you question your faith in humankind. Side effects of this book include agitation from noises in the dark, diminished interest in your Ouija board, refusal to learn Latin, and an overwhelming urge to avoid the basement.
I heartily recommend this book to fans of well-written murder mysteries, ghost stories, and Hitchcock movies. It has the feel of a detective novel, but the ghostly investigation makes it rise above. Pardon the pun.