Bird?s Eye View is a great work of historical fiction.
And this is where the book becomes amazing. I learned more about British and allied wartime intelligence than in any other book I?ve read on the subject.
Elinor Florence is a journalist whose career spans five provinces, from editing daily newspapers, including the Winnipeg Sun, to writing for Reader's Digest Canada. Most recently she published her own award-winning community newspaper. Elinor grew up on a Saskatchewan farm and now lives in the mountain resort town of Invermere, British Columbia.
While the story may be one of fiction, Florence hasn?t escaped her reporting past so easily, with large amounts of research and historical facts surrounding her characters.
This debut novel is filled with drama, romance and plenty of colourful Canadian wartime history.
Simply put, Bird's Eye View is the best book I have read in the past year. Not only is the book well-crafted and researched, but so convincing that it is hard to believe it is a novel and not an autobiography. I could hardly put the book down, but did so after each chapter or two because I didn't want to race through it, and preferred to savour the story over more time. Although aviation research is a major field of my work, I knew virtually nothing about wartime photo interpretation, so a bonus for me was learning about that. Elinor's book provides an accurate picture of an aspect of wartime life both for those in uniform and the effects on civilians, centered on the mail character in the story. This book will be of interest to anyone with an interest in the Second World War, but stands on its own as a fine read for anyone who appreciates good literature. I have recommended it to many family and friends, and after reading the book they share my opinion of it.
Everything Florence writes is vividly alive, but those who remember V-E Day will feel it?s April 1945 on reading this story.