The Cuckoo’s Calling is book 1 in the Cormoran Strike series. Written in 2013 by J. K. Rowling under the pen name Robert Galbraith, this is a true mystery novel without any strange embellishments. 550 pages on Kindle.
The protagonist is Cormoran Strike, ex-British Army, Special Investigation Branch (SIB), which is essentially military detectives. That’s a close parallel to Jack Reacher’s Special Investigation’s Unit, which makes me wonder how much influence Lee Child (James Dover Grant) had on Rowling when she invented Cormoran Strike. They’re both big men and ex-military-police, but mercifully that’s where the similarities end. Strike is nothing at all like Reacher (who is, I’ve always thought, a sort of force-of-nature rendition of Street Justice).
Strike, basically, is a hot mess. He’s a private detective in his mid-30’s, gone to seed, missing a leg —war wound — and at the start of the book is homeless because he’s ended a long-term but unstable relationship with his crazy and now very recently ex-girlfriend. Like Reacher, he owns very little, but that’s just because he’s poor. On the other hand, he’s a brilliant detective so, you know, he doesn’t end up drinking himself to death in the gutter.
In the spirit of avoiding spoilers, I can say that someone famous is recently dead. It’s ruled a suicide. A relative will not accept the police verdict, so the relative hires Strike to look into the matter.
Along the way there’s a very attractive young woman (Robin Ellacott) who shows up as a temporary secretary, but don’t call her that, and who proves extremely helpful in the investigation. I see echos here of Mickey Spillane’s Velda (Mike Hammer’s secretary and love interest), but honestly it’s been so long since I last read any Spillane that I don’t fully remember Velda. I might have to go spelunking in the few physical books that I own to see how close the parallel is.
{{As an aside, I also note that Mike Hammer was also ex-army — WWII, US Army, Pacific theater. But at least he wasn’t some kind of military detective. Now that I think about it, so was Thomas Magnum (Magnum P.I) who was a Navy SEAL and intelligence officer during the Vietnam War. It does make me think that ex-military now private detective is in danger of becoming something of a cliché. At the very least, I’m spotting a formula.}}
So there you go: The Cuckoo’s Calling is a real “who-dun-it” mystery complete with a stubborn and brilliant detective, and his spunky and surprisingly resourceful assistant. The mystery is engaging, plenty of twists and turns, lots of misdirection, and a satisfying conclusion.
Mysteries are, really, the fine-art of fucking with your readers. A skillful novelist carefully guides you into thinking one person “dun it” and then at the last minute yanks your chain and shows you how someone else is the culprit. Rowling certainly does that here. About halfway through the book I know who Rowling wanted me to believe did it, but having never read Rowling as a mystery writer before I wasn’t sure if she was just being obvious or if she was misdirecting me. Turns out, Rowling is a skillful writer who is very good at fucking with her readers. I was surprised by the actual culprit. My one complaint is some of the clues had to do with photographs, which are never fully described. It’s hard to see where its all going if you don’t have all the information.
I knew absolutely nothing about this book going into it other than it was Rowling writing under a pen name, and it’s a mystery. I do know that Rowling is a pretty staunch feminist so I was kind of bracing for the 2013-version of woke. The book even opens with Robin Ellacott and so I was assuming that she would prove to be the protagonist — a brilliant woman in a man’s world, that sort of thing. But it didn’t go down that way, although I wonder if it doesn’t go in that direction with subsequent books. Anyway, I am impressed by Rowling’s ability to write a man. At no time did her depiction of Strike ring false for me. Maybe it’s because us XY’s are just that obvious and predictable, but I thought she did a good job.
Will I read the next book in the series? Yes. Today I took out a library card that allows me to get ebooks, and I wanted to test the system so I checked out The Silkworm. So now here I am, reading away on that one. I’m quite interested to see how things shape up between Cormoran Strike and Robin Ellacott. I’m thinking I’ll have to take a quick detour though Spillane at some point because I really want to see how much of Velda is in Robin. I’m also curious to see if I can hack the way Rowling thinks and so spot the real bad guy before the end of the book.
I recommend this book if you’re looking for an old-school who-dun-it.
C’ya!