Longlisted for the CWA John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger 2017.
A clever first novel with a sinister setting in London where blocks of flats are being demolished. The juxtaposition of the bird watcher protagonist, Lily, and her people watching is a clever one as she views the people in the flats opposite. This device used ensures the atmosphere builds well and this is also helped with the intriguing chapter headings. The protagonist has a great imagination; names the people, gives them lives and witnesses things she should not. Strangely she is mistaken for a doctor and when called to a dead woman, whom she has recently visited, she takes on her own investigation. That’s when things get mysterious and the novel really changes gear. Lily gets into all sorts of trouble, someone is watching her, but who, and is she really watching at all and indeed seeing what she's seeing?
'Ross Armstrong will feed your appetite for suspense.' - The Evening Standard She's watching you, but who's watching her? Lily Gullick lives with her husband Aiden in a new-build flat opposite an estate which has been marked for demolition.
A keen birdwatcher, she can't help spying on her neighbours. Until one day Lily sees something suspicious through her binoculars and soon her elderly neighbour Jean is found dead. Lily, intrigued by the social divide in her local area as it becomes increasingly gentrified, knows that she has to act. But her interference is not going unnoticed, and as she starts to get close to the truth, her own life comes under threat. But can Lily really trust everything she sees? 'The Watcher is an intense, unsettling read...one that had me feeling like I needed to keep checking over my shoulder as I read.' - Lisa Hall, bestselling author of Between You and Me
'A twisted homage to Hitchcock set in a recognisably post-Brexit broken Britain. Tense, fast-moving and with an increasingly unreliable narrator, The Watcher has all the hallmarks of a winner.' - Martyn Waites
'Ross Armstrong will feed your appetite for suspense' - Evening Standard
'A dark, unsettling page turner' - Claire Douglas, author of Local Girl Missing
'Creepy and compelling' - Debbie Howells author of The Bones of You
'The Watcher is an intense, unsettling read... one that had me feeling like I needed to keep checking over my shoulder as I read.' - Lisa hall, author of Between You and Me
Author
About Ross Armstrong
Ross Armstrong is a British stage and screen actor who has performed in the West End of London, on Broadway and in theatres throughout the UK. Among others, he has acted opposite Jude Law (Hamlet), Joseph Fiennes (Cyrano de Bergerac), Kim Cattrall (Antony and Cleopatra) and Maxine Peake (The Deep Blue Sea). His TV appearances include Foyle's War, Jonathan Creek, Mr Selfridge, DCI Banks and most recently, Ripper Street.
After gaining a BA in English Literature and Theatre at Warwick University, Ross joined the National Youth Theatre where his contemporaries included Matt Smith and Rafe Spall. A three year course at RADA followed and whilst there he won the RADA Poetry Writing Award. The idea for his debut novel The Watcher came to him when he moved into a new apartment block and discovered whilst looking at the moon through binoculars that he could see into his neighbours' homes. Thankfully for them, he put down his binoculars and picked up his pen.
He is an avid cricket fan and regular contributor to All Out Cricket magazine. He also has a monthly column in You and Your Wedding magazine as he prepares for his own wedding in 2017.
