The Watchers

Published in 2021, The Watchers is A. M. Shine’s debut novel and draws upon his academic background in folklore and history, as well as his personal experiences of growing up in Ireland. The novel is a work of literary horror that blends elements of the mystery genre. It was adapted into a film directed by Ishana Night Shyamalan in 2024, and the novel’s sequel, Stay in the Light, was released in the same year. The Watchers and its sequel feature a group of fairies, or changelings, that imprison humans in Connemara. The first installment explores the themes of how The Impact of Trauma on Creativity, the process of Gaining Strength From Found Family, and The Tension Between Caution and Compassion.

This guide refers to the Head of Zeus paperback edition.

Content Warning: The source text and this guide discuss murder and death, captivity, and torture. They also mention domestic abuse and alcohol addiction.

Plot Summary

Mina, an artist living in Galway, Ireland, agrees to transport a parrot through Connemara on behalf of her local bartender, Peter. En route to her destination with the parrot, she enters an unmapped forest, and her car dies just before nightfall, so she sleeps in her vehicle overnight. In the morning, she takes the bird and tries to find help. After walking all day, she approaches a building at sunset. A voice calls out to her to get inside the structure, and Mina barely makes it inside before the door is locked behind her.

Madeline is the woman who let Mina in the door and locked it. With Madeline are two others—Daniel and Ciara; they refer to the building as “the coop.” One large wall becomes a mirror at night, and a light shines all night long. When the sun rises, the mirror turns into a window. Before Mina arrived, Ciara’s husband, John, tried to escape the coop and run for help, but “the watchers” attacked him before he could find his way out of the forest. (The watchers are changelings, or shapeshifters, who can become doubles of the humans that they study.)

Madeline explains the rules to Mina, stressing that they must all stay in the light so that the watchers can see them. Additionally, they are not allowed to go underground into the burrows that surround the coop, and the doors must remain locked all night, no matter what. Mina is initially reluctant to believe that the so-called watchers exist, but they shriek and hit the mirror when she gets extremely close to it. 

Mina takes on the responsibility of gathering water from a spring, while Daniel sets traps for their food. They all gather any edible berries and nuts that they see during the day. Madeline, who hides her body under a large blanket all the time, looks strange to Mina from the first time that they meet. (At the end of the novel, Mina will discover that Madeline is a watcher herself; however, because she has the ability to walk during the day, she is ostracized by the other nocturnal watchers. Now, however, Mina has no idea of Madeline’s true nature.) As the months of December and January wear on, Mina passes the time in captivity by drawing Madeline, Daniel, and Ciara in her sketchbook. She also draws a map of the area around the coop and hides it from the others.

One night, they hear a voice—seemingly of Ciara’s lost husband, John—yelling outside the door. Madeline is certain that it is really a watcher pretending to be John, and she refuses to open the door. Ciara protests, but Mina and Daniel side with Madeline, and the door stays locked. Ciara resents the others for this decision.

One day in January, Daniel steals the keys to the coop from Madeline and locks her and Mina outside of the mirrored room as the sun sets. Mina and Madeline hide from watchers in a corner of the structure’s living room, which has open windows that the watchers begin to enter. Eventually, Ciara opens the door for Mina and Madeline. The watchers attack the mirror and door all night. When Mina moves their tree stump table against the door to reinforce it, she discovers a hidden room underneath the coop.

In the morning, they see that the watchers have nearly broken the mirror and realize that they won’t last another night in the coop’s main room. Daniel uses a large boulder to break into the hidden room under the coop, which is a shipping container. Inside, there is a large store of food and water, which Daniel, Mina, and Ciara ecstatically enjoy. Mina brings her parrot into the container and locks the hatch as the sun sets.

Mina also discovers a computer and a video file in the shipping container. The video is of Professor Kilmartin, who originally had the shipping container brought into the forest. Each night, he would hide inside the container, and the watchers would kill the construction workers he hired. Intent upon watching the watchers, Kilmartin brought new workers each day until the underground bunker and the coop above it were completed. He states that escape on the river is possible because he has hidden a boat on the shore and there is a compass in the bunker. However, he advises waiting until the days are long in the summer to attempt this escape.

Madeline decides that they should leave the next day because they cannot remain clean in the bunker. The others reluctantly agree and set off for the river in the morning. Mina lost her shoes and socks when Daniel locked her out of the main room of the coop; she was drying her socks by the fire in the living room at the time. Madeline wants to leave Mina behind because of this, and because Mina insists on taking the bird with them. Ciara and Daniel side with Mina, and they all set off together. The journey takes most of the day, and Madeline leads the way with the compass.

When they get to the river at sunset, Daniel is distracted by a watcher who looks like John; he believes that the figure he sees is truly Ciara’s husband and not a doppelgänger. However, he realizes his mistake too late, and multiple watchers imitate his form before killing him. Ciara, Mina, and Madeline travel down the river until they find a bridge. They lie on the bridge, waiting for traffic to come by. Eventually, a kindly bus driver allows the women to board with his group of tourists and takes them back to Galway. Ciara stays with Mina in her apartment that night, and Madeline leaves while the others are sleeping.

In the morning, Ciara goes back to her house. Mina goes to the university to destroy Kilmartin’s research—as he requested and as Madeline demanded. Among Kilmartin’s papers is a picture of him and his wife. From this picture, Mina realizes that the Madeline she knows is really a watcher who has been imitating Kilmartin’s wife. Mina rushes to Ciara’s house. Madeline threatens Ciara and Mina, only relenting when Ciara gives up a camera that she found in the forest and when Mina assures Madeline that the research has been destroyed. Then, Madeline retreats into the night.

In February, Mina tries to go back to her normal life, but she struggles to create new art. Her biological sister, Jennifer, is upset about Mina’s long absence over the past several months. However, Mina keeps the coop a secret because she promised Madeline that she would, and the sisters never talk again. Instead, Mina maintains her friendship with Ciara, going over to her house once a week. Mina also learns that Peter has gotten sober. He is more than happy that Mina is keeping the parrot as her pet.

In March, while people watching in the pub, Mina finds herself fearfully keeping an eye out for the expressionless faces of watchers instead of seeking artistic inspiration. She sees a particularly emotionless woman whom she has encountered before and suspects that Madeline is imitating this woman. However, Madeline soon appears in the form of a man who joins Mina at her table. Madeline warns Mina that the expressionless woman and another person with her are really watchers who can walk in the daylight, just like Madeline. The book ends with a cliffhanger as Madeline says that Mina is under surveillance by these watchers and is no longer safe.