Robert Galbraith, the author of one of this
year’s highly praised debut crime novels, is actually none other than JK
Rowling. The Cuckoo’s Calling was published in April under the pseudonym.
There were clues dropped by her so that one
could guess but the world really was fooled by her. First of all, Ian Rankin let the cat out of the
bag last year when he announced that Rowling told him she was writing a crime
novel. The Casual Vacancy, the novel written for adults had no mystery element
to it.
But the major
clue was that Rowling always has been a crime writer. Basically, most of the
Harry Potter stories are whodunits like those elements that are available in
Agatha Christie.
The biggest clue
of all is that, the novel is the work of a master storyteller. And in its main
character Rowling has created a dreamy hero whom Harry Potter would like and
respect.
He is Cormoran
Strike, a former military policeman now working as a private eye. Like Harry,
he carries the wounds of old battles: not a scar on the forehead but a missing
lower leg, blown off in Afghanistan.
According to the
Telegraph the verdict of the novel is that the novel is firmly in the Christie
tradition, with the reader obliged to keep in mind the details of a dozen
characters’ alibis if he or she wants to solve the mystery. Like all the best
crime writers, Rowling uses the form as a way of bringing many disparate
characters together and seeing how they spark off each other
In short, this is
a sharply contemporary novel full of old-fashioned virtues; there is room for
improvement in terms of construction, but it is wonderfully fresh and funny. I
hope this is the inauguration of a series that lasts long enough to make Harry
Potter look like a flash in the pan. 
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