Morning Everyone!

Happy Sunday morning. This seems to be turning into my regular review writing time and I love it. Sat wrapped up in a blanket, enjoying Autumn and writing about my recent reads.

This was a book I had been waiting for that completely snuck up on me. I loved the previous three books in this Cormoran Strike series and when I finished the third book I was buzzing for the fourth to be written and released. Then I completely forgot about it, so when I saw Lethal White advertised for release only two days later, to say I was excited was an understatement. Therefore on release day, I had the audiobook downloaded, jumped in the car to go to work and got stuck in immediately.

Cormoran and Robin are back, using their investigative brilliance to solve a multitude of mysteries in the fourth book of this J.K. Rowling series. A troubled Billy visits Cormoran’s office uninvited claiming to have seen a child strangled and buried when he was younger. Billy is quite obviously troubled and escapes from the office before Cormoran has a chance to obtain any further details, but he can’t let it go and end up in a labyrinth investigation involving Billy, far left protestors and members of Parliament. Not only do Cormoran and Robin need to solve this mystery, they also need to resolve the problems in the working and personal relationships between them and others.

Now, I may potentially have a little bit of bias towards this review because I simply loved the first three books in the series, but in my opinion, the fourth does NOT disappoint. I was instantly drawn into the mystery and followed every twist on turn on the edge my car seat as I listened. It’s not for the faint hearted, the audio book runs for over twenty hours so be prepared to settle in, but at no point is it boring.

One teeny tiny point that I think I’d have changed is the beginning chapters of the book. There’s quite a bit of time taken discussing Robin’s marriage, Cormoran and Robin’s relationship and how they’ve got to where they are. I appreciate some scene setting, but I think this whole section could have been tightened up.

Since reading the previous three books, I have watched the BBC dramatised series. As much as I enjoyed the series, it did differ from some of my expectations and things I’d imagined. So before starting this book, I was a little worried about my vision having been tainted and that I’d blur the book with the TV series. It was silly of me to worry. J.K. Rowling does such an amazing job of writing that the TV series was forgotten about instantly. I got so engrossed into the book all of my original visions came flooding back.

In light of ALL of the above, this book, in my opinion deserves a good solid four stars. I kind of wish I hadn’t finished it and could start all over again afresh. Hopefully they create another drama series between now and the fifth book (which there HAS to be) so that I can get my Cormy and Robin fix.

😍😍😍😍😩

“Ultimate responsibility always lies with the woman, who should have stopped it, who should have acted, who must have known. Your failings are really our failings because the role of the woman is carer and there’s nothing lower in this whole world than a bad mother.”

Lethal White by Robert Galbraith