A turnabout of the usual trope- in this case, Oliver is the one digging into the past. His love Kate has inherited an old house and he finds himself fascinated with a secret. It's a good read.

Thank you Netgalley for a review copy of this book.
Unfortunately I did not finish this book as it bored me. The characters were a little uninspiring and the descriptive prose was a little over the top.
There was not enough to grab me into reading more than a third of the book.

The House of Birds is a beautifully told story spanning one hundred years.

When Oliver first sees the house with the beautiful bird wallpaper, as a child, he is smitten with it, and after a chance encounter years later with school friend Kate, who has inherited the house, he becomes slightly obsessed with it.......and the 1920's diary he finds hidden away.

Oliver is a daydreamer who overthinks everything, but he also follows his intuition, and I really warmed to him and his need to discover what happened to the writer of the diary, while also trying to discover who he is as well.

The novel's writing is so detailed and so lavish, I felt immensely drawn into the words and the descriptions of a 1920's Oxford where women were not allowed to walk into the Bodleian Library on their own.

It's a story of the human effects of war, the aftermath, lies and bitterness, the constraints of women, and their frustrations ..... and hope. And one that I found hard to put down.

The story and the characters will stay with me for a long time.

I enjoy stories which weave between past and present narratives and this book ticks that box.

A gentle slow paced story that meandered toward a slighty predictable contrived end but this didn't ruin my reading experience as I found the time spent with McCarthy's novel enjoyable overall.

I adore dual timeline books and this was no exception. I raced through this one wet summer afternoon in our holiday cottage and barely looked up, so engrossed was I in this story. Suspension of disbelief was vital but if you let yourself go and just allow yourself to sink into the story, you'll be rewarded by an immersive read that you'll zip through and thoroughly enjoy. The setting of the old house was skillfully done and made me want to roam through it myself and decipher the hidden diary instead of Kate. The tale of the Calverts/Godwins was well told and kept me engrossed enough to forego my Wimbledon fix for the day in order to get it finished. A great read that I thoroughly recommend.

I am not usually fond of dual time-lines, but with this novel, it worked well. Loved the story, even though it took me a while to get into it. Probably just me. It is the first time that I have read any novels by this author and am looking forward to more.

I usually love books like this one (compared to Kate Morton and such) and I'm always attracted to dual-time storylines. Sadly, I couldn't get into The House of Birds at all. It started off well enough, I loved their meet-cute and the way Oliver reminisce of their lovely encounter. The first part of the diary was OK: I found the characters interesting and I wanted to know more. However, the more I read, the less I cared about everything. I believe the plot moved rather slowly and not much was happening. There were too many descriptions and not enough action in my opinion. I'm afraid I couldn't finish it, but I know this will be loved by others.

Bought many copies for my friends and family for Christmas!

Nice read and easy to follow story line. Look forward to reading more from this author.