Troubled Blood--- Robert Galbraith (aka J.K. Rowling)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"It's longer than War and Peace (600 some pages).\u00a0 It's longer than Crime and Punishment (700 some pages).\u00a0 I should mention Anna Karenina as well since\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Troubled Blood--- Robert Galbraith (aka J.K. 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{"id":38313,"date":"2021-02-01T01:09:09","date_gmt":"2021-02-01T06:09:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/bibleandculture\/?p=38313"},"modified":"2020-12-23T13:14:14","modified_gmt":"2020-12-23T18:14:14","slug":"troubled-blood-robert-galbraith-aka-j-k-rowling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/bibleandculture\/2021\/02\/01\/troubled-blood-robert-galbraith-aka-j-k-rowling\/","title":{"rendered":"Troubled Blood— Robert Galbraith (aka J.K. Rowling)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

$\"\"$ <\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s longer than War and Peace<\/em> (600 some pages).\u00a0 It\u2019s longer than Crime and Punishment<\/em> (700 some pages).\u00a0 I should mention Anna Karenina<\/em> as well since there is an allusion to that novel on the last page of this one. In fact, its the longest novel I\u2019ve ever seen (I don\u2019t count multi-volume novels like the Lord of the Rings<\/em>).\u00a0 It\u2019s easily the longest novel I\u2019ve ever read weighing in at 944 pages (yikes!).\u00a0 You have to be a bookaholic like me to even crack open a daunting novel like this.\u00a0 But I can tell you now, even at 927 pages of text, it is a real corker of a novel, a genuine page turner.\u00a0 The conceit of the novel is that its plot seems in part to be based on Edmund Spencer\u2019s famous allegory The Fairie Queene.\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>One begins to notice (if you can read middle English poetry) that each chapter begins with a quote from Spencer\u2019s work, and then the chapter to varying degrees corresponds in content to the hints in the poem.\u00a0 This is very clever indeed.\u00a0 And I\u2019m happy to say that this fifth in the series is the best in the series by a lot.\u00a0 Partly this is so because Galbraith\/Rowling is so very good at character development, even with very quirky characters like Detective Cormoran Strike, not to mention plot twists.\u00a0 And there is something light and inviting about the way her novels are written.\u00a0 One has less a sense of foreboding or dread when reading the novel (contrast some of the novels of P.D. James) because the lead characters are at times quite comical, and all too human.\u00a0 I don\u2019t much remember laughing during the reading of any and all of James\u2019 ouevre.<\/p>\n

In this novel, and for the first time, Strike and Ellacott take on a truly cold case\u2026 one dealing with a disappearing doctor from the mid-70s.\u00a0 \u00a0 Here is Amazon\u2019s summary tease\u2014\u2013 \u201cPrivate Detective Cormoran Strike is visiting his family in Cornwall when he is approached by a woman asking for help finding her mother, Margot Bamborough \u2013 who went missing in mysterious circumstances in 1974.<\/p>\n

Strike has never tackled a cold case before, let alone one forty years old. But despite the slim chance of success, he is intrigued and takes it on; adding to the long list of cases that he and his partner in the agency, Robin Ellacott, are currently working on. And Robin herself is also juggling a messy divorce and unwanted male attention, as well as battling her own feelings about Strike.<\/p>\n

As Strike and Robin investigate Margot\u2019s disappearance, they come up against a fiendishly complex case with leads that include tarot cards, a psychopathic serial killer and witnesses who cannot all be trusted. And they learn that even cases decades old can prove to be deadly . . .\u201d
\nOne rather unexpected element in this novel is astrology and horoscopes. I\u2019m of the same opinion as Strike that that stuff is \u2018bollocks\u2019, to use his term. Robin however is not so sure, and if you read some of the reviews, it would appear that Rowling herself puts some credence in it.\u00a0 But that\u2019s a story for another day.<\/p>\n

As it turns out, Cormoran and Robin end up investigating various cold cases, involving missing persons.\u00a0 And one has to say that the criminals in this novel are just as quirky and non-stereotypical (with the exception of the Ricci Italian crime family) as the protagonists are.\u00a0 There has always been a frisson between Robin and Cormoran, and one of the things about these novels is that Galbraith reveals a lot of the inner thoughts of these two main characters, who besides trying to solve crimes are also trying to figure what exactly is the nature of their relationship.\u00a0 On the surface they make for an odd couple\u2014 a one legged 40 something man who looks like an extra out of Braveheart, red hair and all, and a 30 something bright young woman struggling to finish off her divorce with her unfaithful husband and fend off the after effects of being raped when young, being cheated on by her husband, and being stabbed in the line of detective duty.\u00a0 No psychological complications there!\u00a0 Without offering up spoilers I will say that their relationship progresses as the novel roles along, as Galbraith plays with the \u2018will they or won\u2019t they\u2019 cross the line between a good professional relationship and a personal relationship. Both are worried sick that they will ruin the former relationship which has developed into a real partnership by engaging in the latter relationship.\u00a0 In short, we all look forward to the further adventures and misadventures of Cormoran and Robin.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"