Running Grave is the 7th novel in the Cormoran Strike series.
Too long. Too slow. But still worth reading as are all the books in the series aside from Ink Black Heart. Do NOT bother with Ink Black Heart. It’s gawd awful.
Running Grave mostly got good reviews.
The many I Ching epigraphs are not needed. Eventually getting annoying.
Cormoran Strike is as irritable and irritating as ever.
Well … perhaps slightly less irritating as he’s quit drinking and has lost weight, due to health concerns.
We still can’t imagine why partner Robin Ellacott likes him as a boss — or for possible romance.
I would have preferred if these two had finally got together. They don’t … quite … in this book.
But their detective agency is finally successful.
In this book they investigate the Universal Humanitarian Church (UHC) — a cult.
At one point Strike realizes it was formed on the site of a 1960s to 1980s commune, one of the places he, and his half-sister Lucy, had lived as a child, as his mother Leda Strike drifted around the country. The commune had closed after its leaders were arrested for child sexual abuse. Lucy was one of those abused.
Robin volunteers to infiltrate the modern UHC …
It made no sense to me that she stays so long. Not much was learned from her undercover weeks.
This book could have been half as long.
| The Cuckoo’s Calling | (2013) | Amazon.ca | Amazon.com |
| The Silkworm | (2014) | Amazon.ca | Amazon.com |
| Career of Evil | (2015) | Amazon.ca | Amazon.com |
| Lethal White | (2018) | Amazon.ca | Amazon.com |
| Troubled Blood | (2020) | Amazon.ca | Amazon.com |
| (2022) | Amazon.ca | Amazon.com | |
| The Running Grave | (2023) | Amazon.ca | Amazon.com |
I’ve been listening to the Witch Trials of J.K. Rowling podcast.
Rowling tries to defend the harm she’s done by attacking people who happen to be born transgender.
I’ve read some of her written defences, as well.
Rowling believes she’s defending feminists. It started by her defending Maya Forstater, who was fired for arguing against transgender people the right to live the life opposite their birth gender.
Rowling believes that you should be allowed to say that biological sex cannot be changed, even if that turns out to be wrong. Rowling believes in freedom of speech on that issue.
Most agree that after a wonderful life, it’s a disappointment that such a wonderful writer and billionaire picked this issue as the hill to die on.
I’m disappointed in Rowling, too.
This controversy is a big part of her legacy.
That said — I’m not cancelling Rowling. She’s 95% good. 5% bad.
In some ways having such a famous person talking about the issue is bringing daylight. We have a long way to go yet in terms of making life fair for transgender citizens.
Rick McCharles 