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Despite the fact that I love and adore Rowling for Harry Potter stories, I am disappointed to find, as an adult, how formulaic and simplistic her writing has become.

Career of Evil takes a darker turn to the first two novels in the Cormoran Strike series, and while I’m not entirely sure how I feel about this sudden change of atmosphere, the novel overall is a major disappointment. The likability of the series already hinges on the characters and the need to know what happens with them, but this book is held up entirely by Robin and Strike’s drama. The mystery within the novel is actually more intense then the previous mysteries but it’s almost shoved into the corner amidst all the Strike-Robin drama.

Rowling excels at characterizations, she is an absolute master at it, but it’s a bit problematic for me when a “mystery� novel is based more on the characters and their drama then the actual mystery. It’s a bit too much to expect from a reader. And honestly, the drama itself just festers and causes so much angst that this book had me actually clenching my teeth in frustration.

Another aspect which seems typical of Rowling’s writing is info-dumping. While the novel is not at all difficult to read, and can be quite enjoyable at times, it’s tiresome when you are reading a 500 page novel and have to wait until the last 30-20% of it to understand everything that is going on. This is irritating, especially given that major portions of the novel just deal with Robin and Strike trying to avoid a conversation about their relationship.

Strike is a character I’ve never been able to get truly attached to, but that was not much of a concern seeing as how these are ultimately mystery novels and it doesn’t matter if I love him or not because he’s just a detective and all I cared about was that he did his job. Robin, however, is absolutely infuriating. I used to be able to sympathize with her but her character is so childish, filled with so much teenage anxiety that I couldn’t stand her halfway into the book. I had a hard time picturing her as an adult by the end, all I kept seeing was a 15 year old girl who had no clue what life was about. I felt bad for her, but ultimately just couldn’t care enough. It’s fairly easy for me to get attached to female characters but as this novel progressed, I felt myself pulling away from her.

Generally, I would say this novel would work better as TV series (since those allow for more stereotypical drama). As a mystery novel, this book is a disaster.