Horror Book Spotlight: The Ghosts of Thorwald Place By Helen Power

A murder in the building. Suspicious neighbors. Everyone is a suspect. 

No, this isn’t another season of ONLY MURDERS IN THE BUILDING, but a novel with a much darker theme and ghosts in it. 

Published in October 2021, THE GHOSTS OF THORWALD PLACE by Helen Power is still on the bestseller chart in the Ghost Thrillers category. 

Readers have found the plot to be engaging, but the climax…not so much. 

So what is The Ghosts of Thorwald Place about? Let’s find out below. 

THE GHOSTS OF THORWALD PLACE Plot

Rachel Drake is hiding away in a secured building, fearful of the man who murdered her husband. One night, a phone call sends her running out of her apartment and into the elevator. But Rachel never makes it out of the building. 

Someone is waiting for her, and Rachel is murdered. But her story doesn’t end there. Tethered to the spot where she was killed, Rachel is now a ghost, watching her neighbors and discovering their sinister secrets. 

It’s not long before Rachel realizes that any one of her neighbors could be her killer. 

THE GHOSTS OF THORWALD PLACE First Impressions

Rachel volunteers at a helpline and is in the middle of a distress call when the book opens. She suspects that the woman she is speaking to may be a victim of domestic abuse, but since the woman doesn’t give her an indication of her true predicament, Rachel is unable to assist her. 

Rachel is seen as someone who cares too deeply about her callers, but the reason why she even took up this job is so that she can work from home. It is clear that she has agoraphobia and doesn’t like to socialize with her neighbors. She is also extremely jumpy. 

When she receives another call and they use her real name, Rachel’s panic attack spikes. 

She then receives a call from Luke, another operator who works behind the scenes. He manages to placate her and infer that one of the abusive husbands may have gotten hold of her numbers and tried to spook her as revenge for helping out their partners. 

Rachel declines Luke’s offer to come over and hang out and even his offer to take a few days off. After the call, Rachel is determined to show that she is no longer a frightened person, and despite having run away from Ottawa with the help of her cop friend, she was going to prove to herself that she could face her fear. 

Unfortunately, when Rachel gets into the elevator, it stops midway when the electricity goes off. Then starts again. It is when she reaches the basement and walks towards her car that she is grabbed and her throat sliced. 

Just before she succumbs, she sees a dark shadow twirling towards her. 

In the next chapter, the neighbors have sounded an alarm, the police have arrived, and Rachel realizes she is now a ghost and no one can hear her. She tries to move forward and finds herself back near the elevator. 

She is able to visit different floors but is limited to the apartments near the elevator. 

Rachel peeks into Sabryna’s life, who is the dutiful wife to Roger. But as Rachel follows him around, she sees him visiting a different floor and meeting a young man, his lover. Rachel is shocked to see Roger cheating on his wife. 

The sample ends here. 

READ OR SKIP?

The Ghosts of Thorwald Place may be a thriller and mystery, but it quietly also plays into the soap opera trope. Neighbors with secrets? Who doesn’t want to know what they are? 

The author writes a compelling story from page one. We meet the protagonist and understand her psyche quickly through her reactions to other people or towards herself. The pacing can be slow between chapters at times, especially when the thrilling part has just ended, and the desperation to know what happens next is initiated. 

The Ghosts of Thorwald Place is definitely a READ. 

Whether or not it fits in the Horror bracket, it definitely does well in creating a mystery drama where you just want to know who the killer is and whether it really is one of the neighbors. 

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