After losing his leg to a land mine in Afghanistan, Cormoran Strike is barely scraping by as a private investigator. Strike is down to one client, and creditors are calling. He has also just broken up with his longtime girlfriend and is living in his office.Then John Bristow walks through his door with an amazing story: His sister, the legendary supermodel Lula Landry, known to her friends as the Cuckoo, famously fell to her death a few months earlier. The police ruled it a suicide, but John refuses to believe that. The case plunges Strike into the world of multimillionaire beauties, rock-star boyfriends, and desperate designers, and it introduces him to every variety of pleasure, enticement, seduction, and delusion known to man.
Rating: 4.5/5
Review:
The Cuckoo's Calling, written in third person point of view by Robert Galbraith, was a surprisingly entertaining book to read. The characters had round personalities which was paired with gradual character development, there was an entertaining plot which was, as hard as it is to admit, slightly predictable, and the writing style was simple yet professional and elegant.
Firstly, the characterization in The Cuckoo's Calling is something that has failed to make an appearance in too many books, so it was very refreshing to see characters with personalities and quirks so unique to themselves. The way the characters acted to certain situations was always appropriate given the information the readers were given about their personal lives. Even the side characters had distinctive personalities that really set them apart from everyone else. Since this is a mystery-crime novel, there were a lot of side characters all of which were extremely important. Not only that, but their personalities really stood out through their statements in the end of novel when the mystery was solved. Along with the unique personalities, there was also character development, which is a huge plus to any book.
Aside from the characters, Galbraith succeeded in drawing in the readers with a simple yet compelling storyline. There was the perfect amount of foreshadowing throughout the book which really aided in the mystery aspect of the story. As mentioned previously, The Cuckoo's Calling was slightly predictable. It was not predictable in the sense that the readers knew exactly what a character was going to do and when they was going to do it. In fact, the reader was mostly surprised at what was happening at that specific moment. It was predictable in the sense that the main idea was stereotypical; the main idea being 'was it a suicide or was it a murder'. With that being said, there should be no regrets after a reader finishes this story. It may not have been one hundred percent satisfying, but the lead up to the end was thoroughly enjoyable and well worth another read.
Something that should be emphasized was the easy to read but sophisticated writing style. There was imagery, detailed descriptions, and a lot of similes. There was also a lot of dialogue, which may or may not be a good quality depending on what kind of reader we're talking about. Some may find the excessive dialogue entertaining, others may find it exhaustive. Even though there was admittedly a lot of dialogue, there was also a lot of everything else to even it out. Just to be clear, this book was about thirty to forty percent dialogue. If that sounds like an amount you can personally endure as a reader, then by all mean, give the book a read.
As a whole, The Cuckoo's Calling is definitely a book some would read more than once, particularly for those who are into crime novels. If you are not very fond of dialogue however, this is probably a book you should avoid.
