Career of Evil by Robert Galbraith, Book Review

   You can’t escape your past. I know that for a fact, I’ve tried. Unsuccessfully. And so did our two protagonists, Cormoran Strike and Robin Ellacott. Neither Strike, a former military police officer, now a private investigator, nor Robin, his secretary and an aspiring investigator, can shake off their past. Imagine trying to build a new life, a career, relationships, and pretending that your past will never catch up with you. But then it finally does. In ‘Career of Evil’, all hell breaks loose when a severed leg is delivered to Robin. It continues with a finger and ends with …. You’ll have to read it, this book with its satisfyingly complex plot and its many twists and turns.

If you like Jack Reacher, then you will love Strike. The author Robert Galbraith, aka J.K. Rowling, is more generous than Lee Child. You get a wider range of evil suspects with varying degrees of depravity, a sharper drawn supporting cast – an altogether fuller picture. Set mainly in London, the investigation takes the pair as far afield as Yorkshire and Scotland, taking in brothels, strip bars, suburban semis, travel lodges and posh restaurants. It’s a deliciously meaty read, full of excitement, violence and perhaps even love. Judge for yourself.

First published in April 2016, ‘Career of Evil’ is the third Cormoran Strike book. Paperback £7.99. Sphere Publishers. The Cormoran Strike books are currently being adapted for BBC I.

Indiana Brown