The Birdwatcher

by Ethel Edison Gordon

Following her fiance’s death in Vietnam, Lisette leaves her defense job to visit her cousin's secluded Scottish mansion.

Genres: Gothic

248 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1974

Reviews

[William · Rating 2 out of 5]

Lisette, a young secretary to a defense contractor, will find that her life is thrown upside down in the matter of hours in this romantic suspense novel. Her fiancé is killed at the very end of the Vietnam War; her job is in jeopardy and soon it seems as if her life might be, too. For retreat, she joins her cousin in a remote house on an island off the Scottish coast, and soon learns that trouble surrounds her--both what she's left behind in New York and what she finds within her cousin's marriage. "The Birdwatcher" is frustrating. Lisette is an appealing, smart and capable heroine. Gordon writes good dialogue and has convincingly complex characters. And yet nothing seems to happen for a long time, until nearly the very end--at which point everything does, suddenly. It's not a boring or trying read, by any means, and all the ingredients are there...they just don't knit together as tightly throughout as one would like.