The characters of Pelican Blood are urban with rather course language and almost seem fatalistic. If I knew them in real life I would doubt if we would be friends as the only thing in common we seem to have are birds. Yet I found them strangley compelling. The main character acts as the narrator and we don't even learn his name which doesn't really matter. I was drawn to this novel because the main players are birdwatchers, as am I. I can understand some of their passion and share part of it. I [...]

In January our local discount book shop was having an extra sale. Normally this wouldn't be anything to get overly excited about as the stock would hardly vary throughout the year and anything worth buying was rarely priced at more than £2.99 anyway but this year, whether for reasons of overstocking or global financial collapse, their sale was different. For a start there was a huge influx of new stock, all priced at 99p, then I discovered that my local branch and the branch near where I work w [...]

This is a brilliant novel, set in the world of twitchers (obsessive birdwatchers who are totally prepared to leap on a plane at a moments notice just to see a rare bird - I'm a birdwatcher myself but I'm definitely not a twitcher). The narrator of the story is a young, foul mouthed cleaner who sometimes takes the law into his own hands when it comes to dealing with those responsible for crimes against birds (eg egg collectors or landowners who shoot and poison birds of prey). He's in an on-off r [...]

Quite a touching book, despite the actions of the narrator, but the events of the ending were just a complete curveball to me dare I mention the word “fridging” here? Nevertheless, the final moments of the book stuck out to me as being particularly breathtaking, and I did enjoy the book, I just felt that everything that happened with Stevie was unnecessary.

Terrible. I'm a birder, but I don't get british birders.

Really good book. I enjoyed the characters and the subject of birding.