J.K. Rowling . . . A Casual Vacancy

J.K. Rowling's new book A Casual Vacancy, billed as her first novel for adults, is out this week.  I was caught a little off-guard when I saw it at the local bookstore, as I hadn't heard anything about it in the last couple weeks.  Usually I keep my ear to the ground but this one just sort of snuck up on me.  Maybe the marketing department over at Little Brown figured she was big enough to pull in sales all by her lonesome. 

With legions of fans just about now hitting early adulthood, this seems like a perfect opportunity for Rowling to make her foray into the world of adult literature.  But without Harry and the gang driving the story, and a depressing unfun story at that, I wonder how quickly those fans will jump on this new book. 

From the bookflap, it sounds like a depressing story.  Set in the small English town of Pagford, it paints an idyllic scene of English country life.  But there's tension lurking under the surface; it seems like everyone hates just about everyone else, and with a recent vacancy on the Pagford Parish council, passions are revved up over who's going to fill it.  It sounds like the kind of grueling fare we'd expect from literary works, and Rowling has demonstrated a remarkable facility for bettering herself as an author.  This is the obvious direction for her to go, and I wish her well, but I'm not terribly interested in reading about small-town English machinations. 

You can find the full review here.