Well, I did download the third one -- I rather like her characterizations, language and plotting, and I particularly like Strike and Robin as characters. But I don't think I'll be listening to it very soon ... judging by the beginning (which I sneak-peeked) it's a serial killer novel, and that's just a bit too much to be following straight on the heels of the mental crime scene images of the second book.
I should be clear he did say they were very well written just not for him. It was a friend of mine that suggested he read them, so I didn't grill him over exactly why he didn't like them; I didn't want him to feel defensive about not liking my friend's book recs. :)
Interesting -- my initial response to book 2 was along the lines of "now I know why she adopted a male pen name for these books", but yeah ... I think David Baldacci or Lee Child would probably have handled this one differently. Not necessarily the crime scene as such, but the description of the fictitious book that inspired it, and also Strike's and Robin's failed / failing relationships with their respective partners (and the emotional fallout).
... wherein the shenanigans may include the likes of rape and the on-stage amputation of various limbs or other body parts, and the final pile of corpses may include some that are served up for human consumption (cf. "Titus Andronicus"). Yep. Apt description ...
That said, we "only" have one body here (and mid-book, not at the end), but the crime scene and the inspiration for its creation are definitely worthy of that particularly literary heritage. And it's deliberate, too ... [almost] every single one of the victims has enough of a background in English Lit to be cognizant of this enchanting heritage, and therefore as capable of having deliberately used it as the victim seems to have done in his book. (They're all various members of the publishing industry. Now I wonder what Rowling may have wanted to imply by that ... )
Yes, Titus Andronicus is in some ways the most extreme one I've come across - but The Revenger's Tragedy takes the biscuit for sheer weight of corpses, since *every* significant character ends up dead except for one...who's been banished for life...
I had similar feelings when I read it in 2014. "Career of Evil" is even much darker... Even the supposed "romance" between the two main characters is given in narrative dark tones. When Pessoa "invented" the heteronym, it was for authors like these...Everything is so frigging different...
Your review made me want to re-read the trilogy...
I sure did. I’m eagerly waiting for it to come out…I’m not much for Crime Fiction, but there’s something in me that makes me like this kind of dark narrative…Have you ever read “Replacement” by Tor Ulven? Now, that’s stifling dark
That said, we "only" have one body here (and mid-book, not at the end), but the crime scene and the inspiration for its creation are definitely worthy of that particularly literary heritage. And it's deliberate, too ... [almost] every single one of the victims has enough of a background in English Lit to be cognizant of this enchanting heritage, and therefore as capable of having deliberately used it as the victim seems to have done in his book. (They're all various members of the publishing industry. Now I wonder what Rowling may have wanted to imply by that ... )
Your review made me want to re-read the trilogy...
Btw., did you see this? https://twitter.com/jk_rowling/status/977223417857478661