Ravelry Knitters discussion

The Casual Vacancy, J.K. Rowling's first book after Harry Potter, won the poll for our January read. I'm interested to see if her adult fiction is as good as her children's.

I haven't read anything of hers so have nothing to compare it to. I'm looking forward to this, great choice. I'm way behind though, my library finally got a copy of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. ;-)

I started this sometime last year and chose not to finish it. So I'll pass this month and see you all again next month.

Kathryn -- I think you'll like A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. I really did!

Dunno if I should participate, as I've already read The Casual Vacancy, but I could always read it again.

I enjoyed it well enough, I suppose.

Hi, I just joined this group and while I'm not going to participate in this read along, at this point I can't put anything ahead of the books popping up from my OD wait list, I do want to say that I have read the other two books by Rowling under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith. They are a series about a private detective and his assistant, I found them pretty good and look forward to the next. I think A Casual Vacancy got mixed reviews so don't avoid her others based on this one is I guess my point.

I just got my copy from the library today so I should get it started tonight.

And I just got mine too. But I have to finish A Tree Grows in Brooklyn first, as it is in demand and I can't renew it.

Well...I've started Casual Vacancy. I'm not sure how far I'll get into it before I decide not to finish it. So far (only 32 pages) I'm finding it difficult to believe there are 471 to go.

When I read a review that said it picks up and gets exciting at 300 pages, I knew that isn't gonna happen. Hopefully it'll start being less of a grind. Already I can't keep track of all the people.

I read Casual Vacancy some time last year and won't be reading it again. It's not bad, really, just - meh.

Having loved HP I was eager to pick up Casual Vacancy and was surprised at how gritty it was.
I found it highly believable and once I got used to the style change I really enjoyed it.

I read it shortly after it came out, and I remember really enjoying much of it, but after I finished, I didn't want to read it again. Once was enough. My favourite part of the story was the setting--the way Rowling described the village and its inhabitants and set the story up was amusing and snarky, but as it grew darker and I could see where it was going, I had mixed feelings about it. I liked that she went for a story with the kind of ending that was drastically different than Harry Potter, but some of the content felt more like a declaration of "this is not Harry Potter! This is not a children's book!" rather than being necessary to the plot.

I read this book when it came out. Actually listened to it on Audible. I gave a British husband too, so maybe that, combined with the fabulous narrator who really got the accents and tone of the little village and its petty politics down, won me over. I really enjoyed this!!!

Just finished. It took a long time for me to get into - I think there were maybe too many characters introduced too quickly. But once I got more into the story I really enjoyed it. It was a lot darker than I expected, but quite realistic I think. Certainly nothing like Harry Potter! I'm looking forward to reading her Robert Galbraith books now.

I'm still plowing through it. I agree that I've given up on keeping track of all the characters and it's become more enjoyable. I'm almost to page 300. Rarely do I continue reading a book at this point when I'm thinking 'only 200 more to go' but I keep thinking that maybe someone will have a lightbulb moment and turn into a decent human being. One can only hope. Or maybe they'll go on flaming each other til the end. Oh I can hardly wait to find out.

I've just found out the BBC have made a 3 part mini series which starts in two weeks. I rarely watch TV but this looks like it could be good.

I'm done! I stayed up late last night and speed read the rest. From the start, I wished that Barry had lived and most of the rest of them moved out of town. I thought I might have liked him. His wife and children seemed decent too. Oh well, on to the next!

Kathryn wrote: "From the start, I wished that Barry had lived and most of the rest of them moved out of town. I thought I might have liked him."

Me too - I think I would like a whole book about Barry!

One thing Rowling is great at is making you care about the characters. I found the stories of these characters very compelling despite the difficulty of their lives. I think I agree to the comparisons to the classic Middlemarch by George Elliot. The live of people in one town and how one life has such impact on all the others in the town.