So, having finished my Independence Day extra roll books, I am (finally) allowed to roll again:

 

 

Starting from "GO", this takes me to square 7: The Stay-Cation -- read a book with a house on the cover or related to something unique about your community.

 

My audio edition of J.K. Rowling's Casual Vacancy has ... well, enough upper parts of houses on the cover to convey the idea of a house, so I'm going to run with that.

 

Length of equivalent print edition: 512 pages

=> + $5 upon completion.

 

 

 

I found it interesting the "hero" of this story is a dead man. The majority of the characters being developed are not very likeable. The teenagers are much more well developed than the older characters in my opinion. The story is really quite gripping initially and I powered through this book. However I felt a bit let down by the election and the ending once I got there.

I particularly liked the differences between the households and interactions portrayed and I felt the social worker was suddenly dumped at points but was a very engaging character for me. I didn't like the focus on so much of the characters appearances over their behaviors but this was tempered by the portrayals of the different key teenagers to the story

It was interesting but I struggled at the finish. I think there could have been a few more chapters as it petered out a bit with a feeling of "and then she woke up" feelings...

I have not read anything previously by this author and I would read something else but still feel a little disappointed by the tailing off of the conclusion.

I found it interesting the "hero" of this story is a dead man. The majority of the characters being developed are not very likeable. The teenagers are much more well developed than the older characters in my opinion. The story is really quite gripping initially and I powered through this book. However I felt a bit let down by the election and the ending once I got there.

I particularly liked the differences between the households and interactions portrayed and I felt the social worker was suddenly dumped at points but was a very engaging character for me. I didn't like the focus on so much of the characters appearances over their behaviors but this was tempered by the portrayals of the different key teenagers to the story

It was interesting but I struggled at the finish. I think there could have been a few more chapters as it petered out a bit with a feeling of "and then she woke up" feelings...

I have not read anything previously by this author and I would read something else but still feel a little disappointed by the tailing off of the conclusion.

I started this book in May. MAY. 

 

I had the hardest time getting into it at first, the redundancy was murderizing my will to continue.  I was going to quit, but I had read a few discussions about it, finding there were many people that were feeling the same way, but they were persuaded to keep going, and they were right.  Once the story got to the funeral, it really picked up and was a pretty good read.

 

There were a lot of characters and sometimes I had a hard time keeping them all straight, but it worked itself out as I kept reading.

 

[spoiler] I'm still trying to figure out who my favorite character was.   Some I despised, like Samantha, Simon and Shirley.... Some just seemed cardboardy... Ruth.

 

I guess I felt the most for Sukhvinder. WAS she really a hermaphrodite, or was that just Fats getting into her head?  I'm glad her mother finally realized what a bitch she was and came back to her senses.

 

I also just wanted to snatch Robbie up and run. 

 

I think that if I ever lived in a town like that... that thrived on gossip and being fake, I'd wish for my demise.

[/spoiler]

 

This is a decent read it you can get through the beginning.

I wish I hadn't waited so long to read this book. It's been sitting on my TBR list and I kept passing it up. Then I saw that HBO was making a mini-series out of it and I didn't want to watch it before I read it.

 

What an incredible character study. Rowling connects the citizens in Pagford to one another in interesting and sometimes unexpected ways. I wasn't sure where most of the story lines were going much of the time and I didn't want the book to end. I felt like I knew these people, the good and the bad. 

 

Now I'm off to watch the show.