Review: The Cuckoo's Calling by Robert Galbraith

The Cuckoo's Calling by Robert Galbraith
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I’m about to reveal my secret!!!!!!!! I have purchased lots and lots of Harry Potter’s books – you know the time that every small and big kid wanted one….well, I gave them out as birthday and Christmas presents….but me…. I haven’t read of them….though my son devoured each book and I have the entire series in my bookcase…I just haven’t had that “read me, read me” pull….Yes, truly!!!. I started book #1 and gave up after a couple of chapters. I know….I should have persevered but I did not…….maybe one day…it did take me over 30 years to read the Lord of the Rings books (which I totally loved)...so who knows!! But wait, I am not doing a review on Harry Potter or Frodo! I’m writing about a totally different book altogether and the only connection to Magical Harry P is the author.

That’s right!!! A more different genre could have never been guessed by us veracious readers!!!– And if you haven’t read all the hype about her writing something not in same genre of Harry P and using a pseudonym…then you must be one of the very few people on this planet!! And if anyone ever believed that it was “overs” for JK after the epic and magical saga of Harry P..let me just say how wrong they would be!!! Yes, even despite all the hype and build-up.

A Cuckoo’s Calling by Robert Galbraith a.k.a J.K. Rolling is actually pretty good. No magic wands, no potions, witches and spells…here we have a good, gripping, and interesting mystery tale filled with supermodels, fame, family, murder, betrayal, greed that introduces a character that is not your hero norm, but wow…..by the end of the book….he’s become one of those unforgettable fiction characters that stay with you for a long time.

I loved the take on rockstars!!!!!!!!!!!

“Like other inveterate womanizers Strike had encountered, Duffield’s voice and mannerisms were slightly camp. Perhaps such men became feminized by prolonged immersion in women’s company, or perhaps it was a way of disarming their quarry.”

Cormoran Strike is a private investigator whose business is not doing too well. One-legged (lost the other in Afghanistan fighting for Britain!!), overweight, bad dresser, not handsome in the least, homeless and living in his office – a total underdog!! Really!! his father, the ageing rock star who never married Cormoran’s dead groupie mother, is even demand interest on a loan he made to C!!! But under all that is an honorable and honest human being and that’s what pulls you in and has you wanting him to win all the obstacles in his life.

“Strike was used to playing archaeologist among the ruins of people’s traumatized memories;”

Besides C, there are so many other memorable characters. Robin, his secretary was the other favorite of mine in this story

“Robin was disposed to feel desperately sorry for anyone with a less fortunate love life than her own – if desperate pity could describe the exquisite pleasure she actually felt at the thought of her own comparative paradise.”

, about a murder of Lula Landry, a supermodel.
The writing style is really great - elegant prose that flows beautifully, keeping you turning page after page.
I loved the Englishness in this story……..I really smiled reading this………

She looked away from him, drawing hard on her Rothman’s; when her mouth puckered into hard little lines around the cigarette, it looked like a cat’s anus.

The imagery……

“Yeah,” he said.
Duffield had returned, holding another drink, cleaving his way back through the crowd, whose faces revolved after him, tugged by his aura. His legs in their tight jeans were like black pipe cleaners, and with his darkly smudged eyes he looked like a Pierrot gone bad.

The settings in a dark and gothic London

are so vividly written that you can feel the cold, the grayness and menace that surrounds this world of rock stars, supermodels, designers and the paparazzi. Incredible sense of place and characters that brings it and them all to life.
Allright….let me just say – get this book, not because it’s a J.K. Rowling only but that it’s a great mystery read.
Some quotes that I thought were great…..

“How easy it was to capitalize on a person’s own bent for self-destruction; how simple to nudge them into non-being, then to stand back and shrug and agree that it had been the inevitable result of a chaotic, catastrophic life.”

“The dead could only speak through the mouths of those left behind, and through the signs they left scattered behind them.”

How true is this????

“Couples tended to be of roughly equivalent personal attractiveness, though of course factors such as money often seemed to secure a partner of significantly better looks than oneself.”

And yes, I am hoping we get a bit more of Cormoran Strike. I loved his way of solving the case and it would make a great series.


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