Book: Troubled Blood (Cormoran Strike Book 5)
Author: Robert Galbraith (aka JK Rowling)
Pages: 888
Read on: Kindle
Read in: ~8-9 hours over two days
Plot Summary: Private Detective Cormoran Strike is visiting his family in Cornwall when he is approached by a woman asking for help finding her mother, Margot Bamborough - who went missing in mysterious circumstances in 1974.
Strike has never tackled a cold case before, let alone one forty years old. But despite the slim chance of success, he is intrigued and takes it on; adding to the long list of cases that he and his partner in the agency, Robin Ellacott, are currently working on. And Robin herself is also juggling a messy divorce and unwanted male attention, as well as battling her own feelings about Strike.
As Strike and Robin investigate Margot's disappearance, they come up against a fiendishly complex case with leads that include tarot cards, a psychopathic serial killer and witnesses who cannot all be trusted. And they learn that even cases decades old can prove to be deadly.
General Thoughts and a Disclaimer: JK Rowling has brought a lot of joy to our lives through her books. The Harry Potter series and the Cormoran Strike series have been books my sister and I have thoroughly enjoyed.
In the recent past, JK Rowling has made some hurtful comments about transgendered people, which have caused hurt and anger. I would like to mention that this blog is a trans-safe/ trans-acceptance place and we believe that trans men are men and trans women are women. We are so sorry that JKR's comments have hurt you.
I saw a lot of posts on Goodreads and elsewhere asking people to boycott JKR's books. On that, I have to say that we choose to separate the art from the artist and hope that in time, JKR learns to empathise more with our trans brothers and sisters and lives up to the values of kindness and inclusion that she so vociferously espoused in her Harry Potter books.
Things I Liked:
1. To start with, I loved the premise of this book! A 40-year old cold case! A young woman, a doctor (GP), leaves her practice to meet her best friend at a pub that's barely a five-minute walk and just vanishes without a trace! No one has heard or seen her ever since.
The cop investigating Margot Bamborough's case was in the midst of a mental health crisis and he was fixated on a serial killer operating in that general area called 'The Essex Butcher'. He did not seriously look into other suspects. There is very little to go on- a lot of eye witnesses and people who knew Margot back in the day are dead. So, it seemed like Strike and Robin would have their work cut out for them to solve this one! Very interesting, indeed!
I love cold cases! There is a British series called Unforgotten, which we really love because it involves a team of Met detectives solving cold cases! Cold cases are challenging because detectives can not rely on any of the trappings of modern technology that they can currently use to pinpoint last location or figure out who was calling someone one too many times etc. So, Strike and Robin taking on this very challenging case with so little to go on made for a very exciting reading!
2. This book is very, very detailed. The main focus of it is, obviously, the disappearance of Margot and Strike and Robin's attempts to solve that case. Apart from that, there are 3-4 smaller cases that Strike and Robin's team is working on, which are also quite interesting. This book is 888 pages (on the Kindle) and 944 pages (hardcover edition) long and, I know, that is something that can put people off. I really enjoyed reading this book in all its detailed, immersive, atmospheric glory! JKR is a gifted writer and she successfully builds the world of 1974 where Margot lived and loved and worked. As a reader, you get pulled into that world as Strike and Robin painstakingly find and interview various people close to Margot back then.
This book is a truly immersive read and I'd advise patience and many breaks as you dive into the world of 1974, which also includes the antics of a creepy serial killer! Trigger Warning for rape and torture- skip those chapters, if these topics trigger you.
3. The investigative process is painstaking and very, very detailed. Nothing is very convenient and JKR/ Robert Galbraith does a great job in showing how difficult it is to find the threads of a life lived in the past with so little documented and so many dead. Robin and Strike follow each lead and find some leads to get to the bottom of what really happened to Margot. It is a slow process, but none of it is boring at all. I loved how realistic most of the investigative process seemed- it was slow-going, led to many blind alleys and many original theories had to be debunked and new ones had to be formulated!
4. The way what happened to Margot was resolved was really nicely done! The case was solved due to how thorough Strike and Robin were- good old-fashioned detective work, which included even chasing down the multiple astrological signs and tarot driven leads of the original detective on the case! His notes were seemingly impossible to make sense of as he was in the midst of a mental breakdown, but Robin and Strike work together to figure out some sane police work out of all that- really nicely done in the book!
Things I Didn't Like:
1. I know this book series also focuses on the personal dynamics and the will-they-won't-they romance angle between Robin and Strike. I am sure some readers are very invested in this aspect of this series, but not me! I found the multiple chapters on both their personal lives very annoying in this book! Robin's divorce, the tragic passing of Strike's aunt, their complicated feelings for one another and even Strike's ridiculously manipulative and toxic ex-fiancee- Charlotte! I was really annoyed when any of these topics rolled along and couldn't wait to get back to Margot's case!
I mean, there was already so much ground to cover in the case from an investigative standpoint that these personal sub-plots, as they were, were not needed in the detailed manner in which they've been included in the book!
2. At 888 pages (Kindle copy), Troubled Blood is a very large book for the thriller/ crime genre! This in itself may be off putting to some readers, who like their crime/ thriller books to be around the 350-400 page mark. Whilst I did not fully mind the length of this book, but the multiple personal narratives did annoy me!
Rating: 4.5/5
This is a really great book and I highly recommend you read it!
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