Career of Evil

Bloody HELL! The third installment of J.K. Rowling's* Cormoran Strike murder mystery series, [Career of Evil], is indeed bloody. A villain with a grudge against Strike plans to avenge himself—all the suspects are men—by harming his (Strike's) attractive partner Robin Ellacott. She accepts a package from a courier upon arrival at work one morning and discovers it is not the wedding-reception paraphernalia she's expecting but a woman's lower leg and foot. Shivery. Before long, the remainder of the young woman is found. Dismembered.

It is hell. Scattered through the book are chapters from the villain's viewpoint, revealing his thoughts and plans, without, of course, tipping us to his identity. We immediately learn how twisted he is; show more here are the book's first words:

He had not managed to scrub off all her blood. A dark line like a parenthesis lay under the middle fingernail of left hand…a momento of the previous day's pleasures…recall[ing] the smell of the torrent that had splashed wildly onto the tiled floor, spattering the walls, drenching his jeans and turning the peach-colored bath towels—fluffy, dry and neatly folded—into blood-soaked rags…
They belonged to you once you had killed them: it was a possession way beyond sex. Even to know how they looked at the moment of death was an intimacy way past anything two living bodies could experience.

Through these chapters we soon realize he's smart, skilled, devious, and intent on a surprise meetup with Robin. But still we don't know if he's one of Strike's three prime suspects, and if so, which one. Of course, each suspect is concentrated evil, sporadically stirring up suspicion, just begging for the Big Slam.

Series books usually display elements of soap opera, and the Strike series is no exception. Robin is still intending to marry her accountant bf, Mathew, though he still denigrates her chosen career and harbors jealousy of Strike. Strike still struggles with and mostly represses his affection for his only co-worker. He enjoys hot sex with striking, cultured, well-heeled ladies but ultimately finds them vapid and forgettable. The police resent Strike's investigational brilliance (and persistence) and the fawning publicity that attends his successes. He still cleans up good, still attracts the ladies, intimidates the men. Robin proves again and again her tenaciousness, self-reliance, resilience, toughness, reliability, compassion, and loyal. And we learn more about her past. Quirky friends and contacts still emerge from under rocks, usually to save a day (or at least embarrassment).

Career of Evil is pretty long (most Rowling books are). She has a lot to say about her villains, her protagonists, and even her supporting characters and bit players. But it was a pretty quick read to me, for it pulls you along relentlessly. I'll give it two thumbs up.

*Oh come on!! Surely you know by now that "Robert Galbraith" is a pen name J. K. Rowling, famous for the Harry Potter books, adopted for this series. show less

Career of Evil strikes me as being darker than either The Cuckoo's Calling or The Silkworm. This time, Strike isn't approached by a client with a case - instead, the case catches his attention when someone sends a severed leg to Robin.
Strike brainstorms a list of men he's had dealings with in the past who would be likely to taunt him in this way. All of these men have committed - or been suspected of committing - acts of violence against women. Even if they turn out to be innocent of this particular crime, they are unpleasant, abusive and dangerous. No truly innocent suspects here.
(There are also brief chapters from the perspective of the killer and they're incredibly disturbing. I ended up skimming/skipping them, and am glad I did show more so..)

So it is dark. Darker than I would perhaps prefer. But it is also a compelling mystery that hits close to home for both Strike and for Robin, for different reasons, and I really like how the story explores that. They cope with this in different ways, they are motivated in different ways, they - unravel in different ways.
I like Strike and Robin's teamwork, and Robin's desire to be taken seriously as an equal. And for her career choices to be taken seriously by the people she loves. (I have a better understanding of why they're less than enthusiastic about her pursuing detective work.)

And I appreciate that Career of Evil is unflinching in presenting these sorts of crimes against women as despicable, sickening, evil. Nor are the victims forgotten in the "fun" of trying to solve whodunit. It isn't a game.

What I said about the first two books also applies here: solid mystery with satisfyingly unexpected twists, the writing is charismatic, with an eye for visual details and astute observations.

When is the next one coming out?

Mist lay in thick, soft layers like cobweb over the treetops of Regent's Park next morning. Strike [...] looked out upon the ghostly park and was transfixed by the effect of the rising sun on leafy branches rising from the sea of vapour. You could find beauty nearly anywhere if you stopped to look for it, but the battle to get through the days made it easy to forget that this totally cost-free luxury existed. show less

Another winner in the Cormoron Strike series. This one ratchets up both the crime level and the tension of attraction between Strike and Robin, his assistant (though she is elevated to "partner" in this installment). There is a serial killer on the loose -- evident in that Robin has been sent a severed leg. Sure that it is someone from his past with a grudge, Strike must track down three thoroughly deranged men that he failed to bring to justice in the past: First off is his "stepfather" Jeff Whittaker, just years older than Strike, a wannabe rocker, druggie and leech whom Strike holds responsible for his groupie mother Leda's death of heroin overdose. Then 2 former mates from the service: Donald Laing who Strike helped discharge show more because of his depraved wife abuse and Noel Brockbank, pedophile and lowlife, never convicted because Strike had punched him during the investigation and Brockbanck suffered subsequent brain damage. One of these psychos now has Robin in his sights both for the pleasure of killing her and for the damage it would do to Strike. Meanwhile, Robin's once postponed wedding to Matthew is now just 2 months away and then it is off completely for awhile due to Matthew's continuing jealousy of Strike. Robin, for a time, chooses her job over her impending marriage, not necessarily for feelings for Strike -- though that is still teased along -- but for her genuine joy in the work and her amazing aptitude for it. More is revealed about her personal past, and with both her background in psychology and her experience of crime victimhood, she seems tailormade for the work. This book is more about cheering her on. Chapters of the investigation are titled with Blue Oyster Cult lyrics (now reduced to small-town summer fairs but at the peak of their popularity during Strike's youth) Creepy for sure and convenient for the killer. Other chapters are from the killer's p.o.v. and those are creepy beyond measure, but vague enough that it really could be any of the 3 men. Masterful plot development by Rowling. The ending comes with a bang -- and then another, so it is quite a surprise afterall. Again, not my usual fare -- so maybe I'm over-impressed, but a thrilling escapist read. show less

Nobody writes melodramatic potboiler whodunits like Robert Galbraith. Her characters are marvelously flawed; the evil owes a huge debt to the grislier Scandinavian writers (Nesbo, Mankell, Larsson); and the romantic tension is delicious.

From the first pages of "The Cuckoo's Calling", I fell under the thrall of the Cormoran Strike novels, snared by the depth and complexity of the characterization.

First there is Cormoran Strike, who, in other hands, might have been yet another twist on the broken ex-(military)policeman with a complex past and a tempestuous love life, but who Galbraith brings to the page as huge presence, a hulking, belligerent Cornishman, with a full-strength bullshit detector, a keen intelligence and a hunger to know.

Then there is Robin, the temp who grabs hold of her opportunity to work with Strike with both hands because it is a life-line that gives her a chance to haul herself out of the life she had been about to submerse herself in and become show more something different.

Finally, there is London itself, both the place, which is evoked with accuracy rather than reverence, and the social worlds it supports.

In "The Cuckoo's Calling" the social world revealed is the tiny ecosystem beyond the velvet ropes of VIP areas where the demi-monde of fashion models and rock stars interacts with upper-middle-class wealth and entitlement.

In "The Silk Worm" the acrimonious, narcissistic, money-driven world of publishing was dissected against a backdrop of gruesome murders and poisonous relationships.

By the end of the second book, Strike and Robin are a team, although neither of them is able to define exactly what that means, and the shifting boundaries of their expectations of themselves and each other, their misunderstandings, conflicts and shared triumphs had become almost a character in its own right.

"Career Of Evil" takes this much further. The relationship between Strike and Robin is now at the centre of the book, not in the typical romance novel "Will they? Won't they?" way but because the plot is driven by monsters from both of their pasts.

The violence in this book is graphic and the crimes are a heinous and yet my attention was more on finding out more about both of these people than it was on guessing who the killer really was. We get an insight into Strike's past through the men he arrested in his time in the Military Police's Special Investigation Bureau and through his relationship with his mother and her charismatic but fundamentally monstrous lover. We learn surprising and difficult things about Robin's history that set her relationship both with Strike and with her fiance in a new context.

The plot is pleasingly complex, laying multiple false trails to pique my interest without ever breaking faith and cheating by omission or simply leading me down dead-ends. All of the trails lead somewhere worth going even when they don't lead to the killer.

By the end of the book, characters that I already thought well-drawn, had suddenly moved into HD focus: vivid and memorable and the ending left me hungry for more.

If you have the option, I strongly recommend listening to the audiobook versions of these novels. Robert Glenister does a superb job. He IS the voice of Cormoran Strike but he also does an astonishingly good job of doing believable versions of the very wide variety of accents that Galbraith's characters have. show less

Welp, she's done it again. Darker, scarier, and more violent than the first two, but unequivocally brilliant. When it comes to constructing a story, I increasingly think she's the best living writer in the English language.

Well damn. I enjoyed the hell out of the first two Cormoran Strike novels--though, really, I think these are much more the Robin Ellacott novels, to be honest--but this one just busted through and kicked the ass of first two in the series.

The writing in this one seemed tighter. It might be that the four diverging storylines--the reemergence of Strike's hated stepfather, the psycho stalking Robin, Robin's rollercoaster relationship with Matt and their impending wedding, and finally, the mystery of the murderer--seemed very personal this time.

Both Strike and Robin's characters were expanded in leaps and bounds in this novel, and the villain was excellent.

If I have any complaint, it's Robin's constant inferiority complex about her job show more with Strike. After watching the business grow and successfully assisting in closing two high profile cases, as well as Strike investing in her training up to now, it's the only thing that seemed to ring false. No one, going through that much success, should be that much constantly in fear of their job.

Other than that, this was an absolutely excellent book, and now I'm stupidly excited for the next one. show less