![]() ![]() I am positive that there will be scores of readers that will be upset, disenchanted, and disallusioned with Rowling's new book. ![]() Go back and ask Melville how his loyal followers liked Moby Dick. We are creatures of habit and expectation. But, there is a real danger in writing a novel your loyal readers might not be ready for. It really seems like you can't write about England's poverty or class struggles without a little bit of dark humor and tragicomedy. Instead of a sorting hat, Pagford's tribes are sorted by money, by politics, by class, and in the case of those around Barry Fairweather - by luck. In 'Casual Vacancy', Rowling falls back into writing about factions and tribalism in communities. Rowling clearly is strongly connected to young adults, because the best parts of 'The Casual Vacancy' orbit the novel's younger characters. It is weird for me, as a reader of all her juvenile fiction, to think of her in the same way with 'Casual Vacancy'. Rowling's new "adult" novel could just as easily been titled 'Poverty' or 'Mortality' (sorry J.K., but Hitch beat you to that title), both of which are themes that play throughout this novel. ![]() In some ways this novel seems like a more middleweight 21st century counterpoint to Martin Amis' novel 'Money'. Or perhaps a better title for my review would be: You don’t have S3X near unicorns. ![]()
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