The Cuckoo's Calling, by J.K. Rowling

I’ve made no secret of it – I think J.K. Rowling is one of the smartest, wiliest broads out there.  After writing one of the most successful book series in the history of western literature (if not the most successful), she could have just rested on her laurels and never written another word.  Rather, she recently published The Casual Vacancy which rocketed to the top of best seller lists.  Also recently, and very quietly, a book called The Cuckoo’s Calling, by Robert Galbraith was published.  It was met with positive reviews by critics and other authors, but for the most part joined the mass market of books that are published every year without making much of a blip.  It wasn’t until new leaked that Robert Galbraith was a pen name for J.K. Rowling that The Cuckoo’s Calling exploded on  the consciousness of most readers.  I read online that within a week of the news getting out that Rowling had published again, sales for The Cuckoo’s Calling exploded by 507,000% - since you couldn’t get a copy anywhere, I believe it.

What’s all the fuss about, you ask?  The Cuckoo’s Calling is the story of Cormoran Strike, former military police investigator turned private eye who has been hired by the brother of a childhood friend to investigate the death of Lula Landry, supermodel and media lightening rod, who purportedly through herself from the balcony of her penthouse apartment.  Strike, down on his luck in love, health, and money, takes the job at twice his usual rate in hope that it will turn his luck around.  What follows is Strike’s attempts to unwind a complex web of lies and secrets woven by almost everyone even remotely involved in Lula’s life.  The payoff of the plot, when it comes, is satisfying and interesting and a little out of left field; it was a great way to end a who-done-it mystery.

In terms of plot, the work is strong, but a plot has to be carried by capable characters.  Rowling doesn’t fail in that regards either.  Cormoran Strike is at once flawed and loveable, which makes for an engaging main character – suffering physically from his last tour of duty in Afghanistan, and emotionally from his last tour of duty with his on-again/off-again girlfriend, Strike is a good guy that finds himself in an unenviable position.  Regardless of that, he’s not one to wallow, and is constantly looking for forward movement in his life.  

The supporting characters in The Cuckoo’s Calling are equally strong; Robin, Strike’s temporary secretary is an adorably competent young woman who, at first blush, seems like she could be steam rolled, but proves that assessment wrong very quickly.  Lula herself, though the reader never ‘meets’ her, is a well developed and fleshed out character; the reader gets to trace her character development from age 16 to her death.  And for the other handful of secondary characters that either sit at the periphery of the main story, or are central too it, all are eminently believable and engaging, though some may not be likeable.

In terms of writing style, I find I have mixed impressions.  The writing style contributes to the relatively quick pace of the forward movement of the plot (there are lags), but it was almost as if Rowling had been watching some film noir while writing her exposition passages – they’re full of boarder-line cheesy analogies and similes that don’t add to the feel of the book, but rather detract.  While a hell of a lot stronger than The Casual Vacancy, this book is definitely missing the spark of the Harry Potter series.  

A last nit-picky word on the book itself.  When I order this work on-line, it was implied the work was sold out and Chapters was waiting for new copies from the publisher (understandable with a 507,000% spike in sales), so I knew the publisher was doing another print run.  I figured that would mean they’d have another chance to fix some typographical mistakes – not so.  There is an instance of repeating a word, and several instances of mistakes with punctuation.  If the publisher had enough time to switch out the previous author’s biography (which paints a picture of Robert Galbraith as a real person) in favour of an explanation that Galbraith is a pseudonym for Rowling, you think they would have cleaned up the rest of it.  Well, since the cat’s out of the bag, you’ll notice that this post identifies the author as Rowling and not Galbraith; lets be honest with each other on that point.

So, final verdict?  Of course, it’s read this book.  Once again, Rowling has contributed in a wiley way to the public zeitgeist.  The Casual Vacancy wasn’t very well received, so she got sneaky with her publishing intentions and found a new and interesting way of presenting the world with her efforts, and I have no doubt that she’ll be turning this book into a series.  While the book itself is strong and interesting in and of itself, I would recommend you read if for the simple fact that it’s now a significant piece of the western literary history, and there’s no point being left behind on this one.  

The Casual Vacancy, by J.K. Rowling

Okay, so… Wow.  It’s been a long time since I’ve posted. Yikes.  There are some really good reasons for that though, one of which I’m excited to share with everyone.  So, back when I started at my job last year, I suggested that my boss allow me to write an institutional history of the association I work for.  It didn’t go anywhere at the time, but in the lead-up to our big, annual meeting, she decided that she wanted not only a history of our association written, but a history of Canada’s health care system and nursing education.  The original brief for the project was a 20-25 paper, within 2 weeks; my coworker and I completed a 46 page pager, with 2 trips to local libraries, 3 trips to archives out of town, and 1 trip to Canada’s national archive in 3 weeks.  It was a bear of a project that reminded me of my student days…. And while I’m not 100% sure, I’m hoping the results will be available for sale shortly.  Other reasons for the dirth in posts: TV season started up, and TV on DVD release dates…

All of these factors were further complicated by the book I was reading shortly before my life got filled with distractions: The Casual Vacancy, by J.K. Rowling.  This book took up a lot of my time before it was released, and a substantial amount after.  After its release, I was wondering when/if I would commit to buying it – but as it turned out, that was wasted time, since I won a copy off Twitter from @indigo_chapters.  I was so excited and waited for my mail with baited breath, and when the book finally arrived, I dived right into it!  Only to experience a sinking feeling within the first 100 pages….  Let me explain.

So, near as I can tell, The Casual Vacancy follows the trials and tribulations of a small rural village in England.  The impetus for the story is the death of one of the village council members, who was in favour of incorporating slums into the village to provide the people who lived there with better services.  On the other side of that debate were council members who were thisclose to getting rid of the community by foisting it off on a neighboring town.  Into this political mine field lands the need to fill the seat left by the death of a council member.  I think.  Here’s the problem: I only got ¼ of the way through it before giving up.

The plot is fucking boring… other than the inciting incident, nothing really exciting happens.  I found myself several times thinking that the events would benefit strongly from a dose of magic, but none was forth coming.  To further complicate the plot are the 600 characters that Rowling introduces and jumps between – and NONE of them contribute in an interesting manner to the main plot.  Some of these character stories are interesting, but in the pages I read, I couldn’t find anything to draw me in and keep me reading.

When you compound a slow moving plot with too many characters and my crazy-ass schedule for the last month, what happened was that I lost interest.  There is no way I have the least desire to finish the book, and I’m super glad I won a copy rather than paying $40 for it.  But this is just another example of why Rowling is the smartest author in the world – though this book sucked, I’m still going to buy her next one.  She’s got so much juice following her from HP, that I firmly believe there’s an amazing author in there somewhere, and this book suffered from a publisher who didn’t want to alienate the golden goose.  I’m hoping on her next try, she undertakes some more judicious editing.

So, final verdict?  Borrow a copy from a library/friend, but don’t buy it.  You should definitely explore this book (and hopefully you’ll like it!) if for no other reason that it’s a major piece of our literary tradition now.  Whether you like the book or not, Rowling’s first foray into literature after the Harry Potter juggernaut is going to be talked about and considered for a long time to come.    

Author review on J.K. Rowling

So this is a post that I’ve thinking about writing (and writting about writting) for some time.  With J.K. Rowling’s The Casual Vacancy coming out this month, I wanted to write up an author’s review on her first (massive) contribution to literature before she begins her next chapter.  (Word play!)  I’ve said it more than once - J.K. Rowling is one of the cleverest women out there, and I’ll tell you why that’s my impression of her….

By now, we all know the story of J.K. Rowling.  Unceremoniously dumped by the father of her children, Rowling was living in a precarious financial position.  In order to make ends meet (and I suspect, recover some confidence), she started writing about a boy whom she had been thinking of for some time – Harry Potter.  The rest, as they say, is history.  The first three HP books were released in the UK to some acclaim, but it wasn’t until the third that the series started getting traction in North America (at least, that’s my impression of the situation).  However, once they broke on this side of the Atlantic, the HP series quickly became a global phenomenon and Rowling became filthy stinking rich.

A word on the books themselves.  The Harry Potter series, for those of you living under a rock, is a set of seven books that trace the school years of Harry Potter.  Harry’s parents were killed when he was just a baby, and he was sent to live with his mother’s sister and her family.  Turns out, Harry’s parents were killed by a wizard who was looking to become ruler of the magical society which exists just below the surface of our own society.  The books cover various adventures of Harry and his friends, but they all contribute to the larger story of the return of this evil magician, and Harry’s fight to stop him.  

Now, when you read that without the context of the books, it sounds silly.  But it isn’t.  This is the first piece of evidence I have to support the fact that Rowling is a wily genius.  She has taken a thoroughly ridiculous concept, one which adults could easily laugh off, and turned it into some of the best written plots, most thoroughly developed settings, and highly engaging characters that the literary tradition has seen in generations.  And she’s consistent.  Book one is just as engaging and just as high-quality as book seven.  

This arc of quality has a lot to do with my second point of why this woman’s smarts should be studies by book-scientists.  Before she started writing book one, she (claims) she knew where book seven was going to end.  Genius!  Over seven books, there are at least 3,000 (maybe 4k) pages of plot development that have to happen.  The fact that she planned out how she was going to get from page 1 to page 3,500, how she was going to develop her characters, how she was going to create her world, shows just how brilliant this woman is.  Want an example of how horribly wrong things can go when you don’t plan out your end game?  Twilight.  ‘Nough said.

This arc of quality also allows for the reader to grow up with Harry.  Let me explain that statement.  In book one, we’re introduced to Harry at age 10.  His concerns are that of a 10 year-old; does he look silly with this hair cut, will he make friends at his new school, the world will cease to exist if he doesn’t pitch in and help?  (Okay, that last one might sound a little dramatic, but all kids seem to think they play a huge part in history – that fact that Harry actually does in his world isn’t the point here.)  In the next book, Rowling ratchets things up a notch – those concerns are still there, but now Harry is playing with a bit more fire, and things are starting to get a bit darker.  Cut to book seven where beloved characters are dropping dead left and right.  The genius of Rowling is that she’s written books that grow-up and mature, much like her readers.  By the end of the series, at 17, Harry is on the cusp of becoming a man, and has to make choices that really do result in a level of maturity that takes him into full-blown adulthood.

Next piece of evidence: the movies.  No shit.  The books made Rowling a household name – the movies made her rich like Midas; everything HP touched turned to gold.  Opening box offices for the HP movies always won at least the first weekend, and consistently won the first few.  The flicks played in theaters for months, then were released VOD or on DVD.  By a twist of fait (which Rowling obviously had nothing to do with), the movies were also released throughout the introduction of Blu-Ray, so Warner Bros (and Rowling) were able to double-dip on the video sales.  Undoubtedly though, Rowling’s ability to sell the movie right and maintain the level of control over the material she did proves her wily-ness.

How do I know she had a high level of control in brining her books to the silver screen?  Well now, that brings me to my next piece of evidence: the title of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.  The seventh and final book of the series builds on the discovery in the sixth book of the existence of the horcruxes created by the evil wizard to ensure his immortality (again, see point one – it’s more amazing than it sounds).  By all rights, the seventh book should have been titled HP and the Deathly Horcruxes: Shit’s about to get real, people!  But, she didn’t go there.  Instead, she chose to name the book for a new sub-plot story line that was introduced.  Why?  I think it’s because she knew that a two hour movie was never going to do justice to the type of ending her books needed to see on film.  By naming the book after an easily droppable plot point (and, I think the screen-play writers could have easily glossed over it in favour of the big finish that the over-arching story has), she ensured that there was no way in hell her characters were going to get short-shrift from Hollywood.  And it worked.  Warner Bros decided to split the final movie in two, and the edit job makes it clear they should be watched back-to-back without so much as a bathroom break in between.  J.K. Rowling, in an effort to protect her characters (since this last book was written after the movies had gone into production), named the book in such a way that guaranteed Warner Bros couldn’t cheep out on the film franchises’ ending.  Genius!

And, speaking of franchises… This broad knows how to ride a gravy train.  The books would probably have set her and her children up financially for life.  The movies are going to make sure that her kids and their kids get to go to really good schools and live in really nice houses for ever and ever.  The tie-in books, board games, and amusement park are enough to ensure that in six or seven generations, the Rowling decedents will still have enough money to cover up a ‘suspicious death’ (Kennedy-style).  Yes, she created a whole host of indelible characters, plot-lines and imaginary worlds, and yes, she deserves to get whatever she can out of that, but at a certain point, you have to ask: when is enough enough?  (I will take this opportunity to caution Rowling – please don’t head into George Lucas territory.  No one wants to see Harry Potter and the Crystal Scull, or in 30 years, the re-release of the HP movies “now in 3-D, with special effects!”  Know when to say no, I beg you.)

Finally, the last point in my litany of examples that prove Rowling is the smartest and wiliest author the world has ever know – The Casual Vacancy.  This woman could have sat back and rested on her laurels for life.  There was no reason she ever needed to put pen to paper again.  She could have ridden the HP train into the grave, and I don’t think anyone would have asked if that was the best of ideas.  But, Rowling has decided to try her hand at writing once more.  She fully acknowledged when this book deal was announced that it might not live up to her HP reputation, and that it would be a complete departure from what the world knows of her.  And she did it anyway.  If you think The Casual Vacancy isn’t going to rock the number one spot on all the best seller lists from now until Christmas, you’re out of your mind.  And, the funny thing is, Rowling can drop a literary duce on those pages, and she’s still going to make a killing, because everyone loves Harry Potter so damned much, we’re all waiting with baited breath for her next literary efforts.  Again, I call genius on this chick.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is my evidence for why we need to consider J.K. Rowling to be the most brilliant of authors.  From humble beginnings, Rowling has managed to create an empire and a future for herself from thin air – one might almost say, what she did was magic.  (Again, word play!)

Update: Check out my review on The Casual Vacancy here!