The Silkworm. Finished audio 2-1-16, rating 4.5/5, mystery, pub. 2014

Unabridged audio read by perfect narrator for this series, Robert Glenister. 17.5 hours

When novelist Owen Quine goes missing, his wife calls in private detective Cormoran Strike. At first, Mrs. Quine just thinks her husband has gone off by himself for a few days—as he has done before—and she wants Strike to find him and bring him home.

But as Strike investigates, it becomes clear that there is more to Quine’s disappearance than his wife realizes. The novelist has just completed a manuscript featuring poisonous pen-portraits of almost everyone he knows. If the novel were to be published, it would ruin lives—meaning that there are a lot of people who might want him silenced.

When Quine is found brutally murdered under bizarre circumstances, it becomes a race against time to understand the motivation of a ruthless killer, a killer unlike any Strike has encountered before…  from Goodreads

Book 2 of the Cormoran Strike series. (1-The Cuckoo’s Calling)

I love Cormoran Strike. I loved him in the first of the series and I loved him in this one.  He’s smart, grumpy and a hero who came back to London after losing a foot in Afghanistan.  He could have milked the media because of his being the (illegitimate) son of a famous rock star, but he chose, instead, to live a quiet life of purpose.  In the last book his private investigating business was in danger of going belly up, but after the acclaim from the last case his business is doing just fine.  He still has his trusty and attractive assistant, Robin, who is about to be married to a jerk, and they are ready to find missing author, Owen Quine, at his wife’s insistence.

Owen has only been missing a short time but the fact that he has written a tell-all about the major and minor players in the publishing world leave Strike with a long list of suspects.  I loved that it took place amongst the writers, editors, publicists and publishers, but it was large group to keep straight. I became more familiar, but no less savvy as to the culprit.  The murder itself was surprisingly gruesome and hard to accept as real.

So far, the star of the series is Strike, but he can only shine with a great supporting cast and a great mystery to solve.  Rowling gets everything right.  Strike has more physical struggles and interaction with his family, half-brother Al, that mad his story fuller this time around.

I’m already looking forward to the third in the series and if you haven’t jumped on the bandwagon yet, what are you waiting for?!