The Birdwatcher

Superb description of a haunting, blighted landscape. His best book so far.

Shaw has more than enough material [here] for a fine procedural, but he interweaves the present-day case with a more personal one, set in Northern Ireland in an earlier generation... the action builds to a thrilling ending.

What a pleasure it is when one discovers a writer who combines the virtues of ironclad storytelling techniques with the linguistic finesse of more literary novelists. William Shaw is surely such a writer, a man whose command of narrative grips the reader by the throat from page one, and never lets go - but also allows every word to register with exactly the right amount of resonance . . . The Birdwatcher, it might be argued, is Shaw's most accomplished (and most visceral) book yet.

Shaw creates a delicious atmosphere in The Birdwatcher, drawing readers in not with high-impact action, but a slower build of tension and character....This is a quieter crime novel, with a style and tone that matches the setting and the diligence of its 'hero.'

Don't be fooled or put off by the prosaic title. There is a lot going on in this book which is artfully presented to the intelligent reader . . . consider William Shaw to be one of the top major talents to emerge in the last five years.

Shaw's writing is clean and unlaboured . . . The rage that would produce a death is terrifyingly familiar to South and in this well-constructed plot, you understand it is destined to reverberate in unexpected ways.

It's exquisite in every way. It's a slow burn book that begins with a violent crime and ends explosively, with plenty of character development and all of the elements that we have come to love and expect in a police procedural story . . . the book should certainly bring additional attention to Shaw's superlative work and undoubtedly will create a demand for more.

A rugged coastal village; a brutal murder; a gruff, solitary detective with a damaged past. The outlines are familiar, but Shaw's prose still sinks its hooks in.

Both plotlines intrigue . . . the action builds to a thrilling ending.

This quiet novel has an air of Scandinavian noir about it - and like the best northerly fiction, it brilliantly uses close character studies to immerse readers in a bleak storyscape . . . The writing is beautifully understated, and the characters are vividly drawn and likable in their imperfections.

A brilliantly constructed thriller... it's utterly compulsive, written in sharp, unsentimental style, and with a wonderfully atmospheric storm-battered setting.

William Shaw is, quite simply, an outstanding storyteller... [The Birdwatcher is] the most gripping book I've read in years