The Thin Wall

A Novel

By: E.M. Parker

Narrated by: Anna Castiglioni

Corona Heights is more than an apartment building. Some believe it is haunted. Others feel it is cursed. None have been willing to confront the terrible secret hidden within its walls. Until now.

Fiona Graves is the building's newest resident. She has given no thought to the darkness of its past. She only wants a place to call home while she begins to rebuild her life. But it will not be that simple. Life in Corona Heights rarely is.

There is something buried inside the walls of her apartment; a secret so horrific, so terrifying, that no one has dared speak of its existence. No one except for Olivia Shelby, the 10-year-old girl who lives next door. Fearing for her life, Olivia is desperate to confront the horrors of Corona Heights, and she has chosen Fiona to help her.

Faced with deadly supernatural forces far beyond their understanding, Fiona and Olivia must reveal the frightening truth of what Corona Heights really is, and the darkness that has, up until now, been safely contained within its walls.

But the pair will quickly discover that Corona Heights is good at keeping its secrets, and it will not surrender them without a fight.

Vol. I of the Corona Heights Anthology

©2017 E.M. Parker (P)2017 E.M. Parker, John Hardy bell

A haunted apartment building

Having uprooted her life from Washington to Denver in the hopes of getting custody of her son, Fiona settles into the Corona Heights apartment complex and finds herself in a creepy building in E.M. Parker’s The Thin Wall. After having been arrested for drunk driving with her son in the car, Fiona’s life hit rock bottom, forcing her to face her alcoholism and other issues. But the apartment keeps drawing Fiona’s attention. Her next door neighbors, Natalie and Noah, get in screaming matches in between their loud metal music that drives her crazy, while Fiona has conversations with Olivia, Natalie’s 10-year-old daughter, through the very thin wall separating their bedrooms. Then the janitor who lives down the hall turns up dead, apparently of suicide, but with some questionable features.

This book is filled with intrigue and creepy details. I kept asking myself whether the strange events were real, with a natural explanation, or supernatural. The details sometimes made me shiver.

Anna Castiglioni performs the audio version of this book. I really appreciated the way she had tears in her voice when characters were crying and almost made me cry. She has a unique voice and empathizes with the characters in her narration. She helped to bring me more deeply into the story.

The Thin Wall does a lot to keep the readers drawn to the story in this book. The character of Fiona comes across as a very real woman dealing with the challenges of life and determined to turn over a new leaf. I don’t usually like creepy books, and this wouldn’t be my first choice of listening material, but I was pulled into this book, almost against my will. I give it four stars.

Disclaimer: I received this book for free from the narrator, but that in no way affected my review of it.

Creepy but slow

It took me awhile to get into this book. It has enough going on that I kept listening but I did lose interest at times and skip to the next chapter. The narration was good, though, not my favorite. I received a review copy at my request and voluntarily reviewed.

When Ghosts and Humans Meet

I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

It is a very captivating story in which human dramas intermingle and fuse with those of ghosts that cannot rest. The plot is very well defined and the reality of the situation in which the inhabitants of a hunted apartment building have to deal with, gives the entire book a suspenseful development of the complex storyline. For a while I had a hard time deciding if the voice coming from the other side of the thin wall was in fact that of a real person or the voice of a ghost. Very intriguing indeed... There are several personal dramas developing throughout the story and not all of them with a happy ending, but such is life...
The performance was superb and the different voices given to the multitude of characters made for a very enjoyable listening experience. This book seems to be the first chapter of a series so the main character is the building itself whose ghosts seem to be trapped there forever. Looking forward to the next chapter and so will you after you listen to this audiobook.

Enjoyed it

Any additional comments?

I love a good horror audiobook and I enjoyed this one.

So very well written and I enjoyed the way the narrator read the book.

Very entertaining.

* I received a review copy at my request and voluntarily reviewed.*

Entertaining Listen

This book has kept me entertained during some very long and tedious commutes. The characters are fun and there are some satisfying twists along the way. The story is suspenseful and there is some violence, but I appreciated that it wasn't too gory or graphic. Looking forward to the next installments.

3.5*-part paranormal mystery,part addiction memoir

3.5* for the story - I thought the plot was interesting and appreciated how the various characters at the apartment were developed. For the first part of the book, it was really challenging to figure out which of Fiona's neighbours were good-hearted good guys, eccentric-but-not bad guys, suspicious-but-not-bad guys, downtrodden-but-not-evil bad guys, worst-kind-of-evil bad guys, and no-longer-alive guys. As the story progresses, the characters become more clearly defined and we get a clearer sense of the plot direction. The reason why I didn't give the story a higher rating was because Fiona irritated me so much. I wanted to put down the story more than a few times, having lost patience with her hyper-hostile/defensive over-reactions (yes, that was redundant) and her self-admitted "chronically reckless decision-making" (quoting Fiona directly from the story). I also thought that the plot got bogged down with her recovering alcoholism - it was a distraction from the supernatural story line, and not a subject of interest to me (speaking from the perspective of someone who has been treated quite poorly by alcoholics in the past).

3.5* for the narration - Usually, when I give 3 or 3.5* ratings for narration in my audiobook reviews, it's because I enjoyed the narrator's exposition voice and didn't particularly like some or all of the character voices in the dialogue portions of the story. Here, though, I found that I had the opposite opinion. I really, really liked some of the narrator's character voices -- the voice for Iris was a good example. Even the voice for Fiona when she was ranting about something or other was really, really effective. But the narrator's normal exposition voice was hard for me to listen to. I'm not a speech pathologist, so I don't know proper terminology for her intonation and pitch. Hyponasal? Falling terminal inflection? Or maybe there's nothing unusual about it at all; it's just rather bland and monotonic for my taste. I can't quite put my finger on it. From other audiobook reviews, the majority of reviewers don't find anything wrong with it at all, so I suppose it's a subjective thing.

I was given this free review copy audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review.

Loved this!

Fiona Graves was arrested for drunk driving while having her son in the car. Her alcoholism was taking over her life and that was her lowest, so she entered rehab. Her husband got full custody of their son and moved. Now 2 years later and Fiona has moved closer to her son and found an apartment in Corona heights. Seems ideal because of where it's located and how cheap the rent is, but this apartment isn't all it seems and Fiona is experiencing some strange things.

I loved this book!! Fiona is a deeply flawed character but is determined to change her life around. Alcohol has ruled her life but when she is caught with her son in the car while intoxicated, it was her lowest point. I admired the fight she put into staying sober and loved how good the author wrote those parts. My father is an alcoholic and I've seen him try to stay sober, so everything the author wrote about this resonated with me. It made me feel more for Fiona because her son was more important to her than anything, and she kept that focus when she thought about relapsing.

The plot of this was awesome!! Living in an apartment where the walls are so thin that you could hear everything in other peoples apartment would be a nightmare for me. Living in an apartment where you hear parents of a little girl being so cruel to her, would be even worse. But when you add in the other things happening in Fionas life, it just made for an even better read.

In all, this was a suspenseful, exciting and entertaining read. When I started it, I was immediately drawn into the world and became invested in the characters, both Fiona and Olivia. My heart broke for the two of them, Olivia because of the way she was treated and Fiona for her battle to be part of her son's life again. I can not wait for the next in this series!!

Anna Castiglioni brought the creepiness of the apartments to life!! She captured the atmosphere perfectly and gave me chills. Her tones and voices were really easy to define and she gave each character their own personalities. She portrayed Olivia perfectly too!!

I was given this audiobook at my request and have voluntarily left this review. This in no way affected nor influenced my thoughts.

Good Ghost Story.

This audiobook was provided by the author, or publisher at no cost in exchange for an unbiased review courtesy of AudiobookBoom dot com

Fiona has moved cities to be closer to her son, who she lost custody of due to driving impaired with Jacob (son) in the car.

Fiona is really trying to get her life back on track and moves into an apartment. Little did she know that the apartment had other plans for her.

This was a very good ghost story and a really enjoyed the narration of it. I could really feel and understand Fiona and her struggles.

I would highly recommend this book!

Very good psychological thriller

Any additional comments?

Very good psychological thriller with lots of supernatural elements. The characters are drawn out very well (I love Iris in particular) and the story moves along at a nice pace. It gets a little 'out there' towards the end, but Fiona's ongoing personal drama keeps the story grounded and it ends nicely. This was the first I've heard of E.M. Parker and his books. I hope there are more to come. I understand this is a series, so I am interested to see where it goes next. The narrator was good too. There were places where her emotion was evident and I could tell she was really getting into the story. That makes a difference, especially in a story like this.

Excellent

The narrator makes the already unlikable MC Fiona even more multifaceted than without the judgemental/whiney inflections.
The thing that stands out the most is the character development. She starts out just like anyone you would see on the street. Somewhat intelligent and driven, and then the layers build. She's an alcoholic who is recently divorced and he ex moves across the country, taking their son with him. You easily simplify with her and even find yourself rooting for her. Then other facets of her personality begin to shine through. She has a trust fund, and she tends to think she's above others who are in similar situations. It just keeps building.
Great story. I have to say I didn't expect the ending and I hope to hear more from this authors.
I was given a free copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.