Title: The Prisoner of Malville Hall
Author: Dorothy Daniels
Date: 1973
Publsiher: Warner
ISBN: 00446-88498-7
Length: 190 pages
Quote: “Other people have more than assumed the presence of ghosts. They swear the Hall is haunted. Dr. Harrington thinks you may be able to make contact with the spirit world better than anyone he knows.”
So his student Cassie, whose intuitive powers hardly seem even average but whom Harrington considers psychic, goes out to stay at the abandoned replica of a Scottish castle called Malville Hall. No sooner is she alone in the house than she finds herself a prisoner, unable to open doors, dial out on the working telephone, or even walk out a door someone else has opened. The house is haunted and the ghosts are determined that Cassie must solve their mystery.
Nothing in this story makes much sense but, for those who like imagining a pretty college girl held prisoner by ghosts who can move objects but not speak, rescued repeatedly by a charming real estate agent, here is that kind of story. Of course all will be revealed in the end, though not by Cassie’s alleged intelligence or psychic powers. Harrington, who is only mentioned in conversations up to the end of the book, will solve the mystery.
I find this novel silly and sexist, and can’t imagine how it was possible for Dorothy Daniels’ name to have sold dozens of other books advertised as similar to this one. You might disagree. The copy I have was preserved as if it had been a favorite for almost fifty years. Some people really like a “damsel in distress” story, and The Prisoner of Malville Hall certainly qualifies.
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