This is the 7th book in Robert Galbraith's (aka J.K. Rowling) series about grizzled private detective Cormoran Strike, a veteran of the war in Afghanistan who lost his leg during the hostilities.....
......and his pretty, strawberry blonde partner Robin Ellacott.
The book can be read as a standalone, but I'd strongly suggest starting with the first book in the series, The Cuckoo's Calling, and going on from there.
*****
Cormoran Strike and Robin Ellacott run the Strike and Ellacott Detective Agency, which is currently doing well after solving several high profile cases. Presently, the agency's work includes surveilling spouses suspected of cheating; getting evidence against a stalker; exposing a toy boy taking advantage of an older woman; and more.
The agency's most important case revolves around the Universal Humanitarian Church (UHC), a cult run by a man called Jonathan Wace (aka Papa J) and his wife Mazu Wace. The church is allegedly dedicated to helping the homeless; giving needy kids a holiday; aiding survivors of sexual abuse; helping starving orphans; and other such good works.
In reality, however, the UHC lures people in, isolates them from friends and family, and then milks them for money and exploits them physically and sexually. An escapee from the cult named Kevin Pirbright accused the UHC of serious criminal activity and wrote an exposé.....
......but publication was stopped by the UHC's powerful lawyers.
Strike and Robin get involved with the UHC when they're hired by Sir Colin Edensor....
..... whose son Will dropped out of university several years ago and joined the UHC. On the one occasion Will's mother and father were allowed to see their son (who was accompanied by a UHC minder), Will looked thin and glassy-eyed.
Since then, Will has not responded to letters and has given the UHC a big chunk of money from his trust fund.
Sir Colin is desperate to extract Will from the cult, and hires Strike and Ellacott to assist in the endeavor. Thus Robin goes undercover, joins the cult, and tries to discover information to be used against the organization.
Robin learns that the UHC worships five prophets, the most important of whom is 'The Drowned Prophet.' The Drowned Prophet is a child called Daiyu Wace who accidently drowned at the age of seven, then (supposedly) came back as a wraith. Phantom Daiyu periodically appears at church services, and is said to haunt people who leave the church and make them commit suicide.
Robin's experiences in the UHC are TERRIBLY HARROWING and take up a good portion of the book (too much in my view).
On the upside, Robin discovers skullduggery in the church, and once Robin gets out, she and Strike try to disclose criminal activity in the UHC and expose the phoniness of The Drowned Prophet. Like Robin's time in the UHC, these activities - which involve finding and interviewing a lot of people with connections to the UHC - take up a good bit of the novel.
As always in this series, some of the narrative concerns the personal lives of Robin and Strike. The duo have been in love with each other for years, but neither one has had the courage to admit it.
So Robin is dating a handsome police detective called Ryan Murphy.....
......and Strike is dallying with a man-hungry bombshell named Bijou.
In addition, Strike's former fiancée Charlotte, a gorgeous but troubled woman, is trying to inveigle herself into Strike's life once again.
Strike is the son of a hippy-dippy mother named Leda and a rock star called Jonny Rokeby, who fathered children with a number of women. So Strike has a bunch of half-siblings, most of whom he doesn't know. In this book, Strike meets his half-sister Prudence - a psychologist, and helps his favorite half-sister Lucy take care of their Uncle Ted, who's starting to suffer from dementia.
The book also focuses a bit on people who work for the Strike and Ellacott Detective Agency. For example, newly hired detective Clive Littlejohn is acting squirrelly; office manager Pat is troubled about something; detective Midge is getting too friendly with a client; and so on.
I'm a big fan of the series, but the book, which has almost 950 pages, is much too long. I hope the author edits the next Strike and Ellacott novel more judiciously. Still, the book is a must read for fans of the series.
Rating: 3.5 stars
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