JK Rowling on Twitter

I agree buying HP merch feels subversive. I recently bought a bunch of HP merch when it was in the Aisle of Impulsive Purchases at Aldi. Sadly both DCs are over their HP phase but I most definitely am not.

💯 this.
I always wonder if Gaiman and Pullman have a bit of glee at the idea of sticking the knife in too.
Whilst both are successful it must fuck them off that she is so influential.

Oh God yes. Completely - finding out who the killer was was almost incidental as far as I was concerned!

nein

i agree, quite obviously the point of a whodunnit is to find out whodunnit….otherwise it would be a theydunnit

i like horror movies and series like Slasher…and they are quite often whodunnits

obviously having said that I would reread and rewatch these things because i enjoy them, I’ve read agatha christie books repeatedly for decades. Give me a few clues as to plot and i can tell who you the killers are

so a fuckwit trying to spoil my fun wouldnt succeed…id just think they were a sad little fucker with no life

(i read nothing about a film when i knew a character was going to die in a star wars movie…i got to the cinema with a guess but no proof, til two little ones ran out of the early show to tell their mum who dies 😒 i may have had a look on my face because she looked at me and virtually ran them out. Wasn’t their fault though 😀)

Thanks everyone. Part of the fun for me is trying to guess "whodunnit" but Robin and Strike are such great characters - from the very first book I was rooting for Robin as she was so obviously in such a bad relationship! I've loved the series for years, long before JK supposedly became "controversial"'so definitely not gonna let a TRA spoil it for me.

Just can't get my head around why you someone would do something so spiteful and mean-spirited. And he would have had to go to the bother of going to a bookshop to look up the ending- what a sad person! I guess I can be thankful I'm not him.

A TRA revealed the killer in 'Troubled Blood' before I'd started it. It did mean a different experience reading the book, although it didn't spoil it. Still a mean-spirited thing to do, especially with books of this length.

Also I'll tell you whodunnit.
It was the Fox Killer, in a Kimono, in the henhouse.

The fuckwittery of the TRAs posting spoilers is this - they think her books are whodunnits - they forget that her power lies in social commentary, brilliant characters, biting social observation and heart.
We read them for Robin and Strike and to spend time in their world.

The ending for the TRAs however is predictable. A public backlash that will end with people demanding to know what was allowed to happen to the children who have been hurt by this ideology and who was pushing it.

I've bought several copies of all of her books in different formats for very happy friends this year.

Just a warning not to read Twitter threads about TIBH - a trans activist is posting spoilers.

For those who have finished the book, do you think it would make a big difference knowing who the killer is and since I apparently do, is there any point in my reading it now? 😢

I bought TIBH today! (And a little Snape figurine, not a Funko Pop thing.) Also got the presents my friend got me for my birthday and three out of the four were HP things. So JK Rowling has got some money out of me today. I love buying HP merch, it kinda feels subversive now.

@UnconscionableSnacking Yes! I noticed that in Troubled Blood (the first one I read) and really noticed it in Career of Evil. It's all very interesting. JK Rowling is bloody clever.

I would quite like the next book to have no smidgen of any transgender, NB or even cross dressing character, just because it jolts me out of the book-world and into wondering whether that will cause the next tizzy in the world of People Who Like to Shout at Authors.

But I expect a complete absence would also be seen as somehow transphobic.

The picking apart of HP books and trying to separate her from her own work is frankly pathetic.

And, of course, IBH is her response to this.

I listen to them on Audible as well. Glenister is great, although Pat does sound a bit like Les Dawson.

I'm another one that listens to audible but Pat sounds more like Mike Reid to me. I keep getting Runaround in my head!

I'm on my holidays and riveted by IBH. I love it. Robert Glenister reads it so well, as other posters have said.

As an aside, in my head, Strike Iooks exactly like the lead actor from Amazon's The Boys (he of the terrible mockney accent)🤷‍♀️

I so admire JK. Love that she's funnelled her own experiences into her work. It feels so revealing.

I like to imagine Robert Glenister getting to that line and thinking ‘You could have said that earlier, Joanne!’

JK does have form for shenanigans with audio book recordings. Stephen Fry tells the story of how, when recording the first HP book, he couldn't get the line "Harry pocketed it" out without stumbling over it. He called JK to ask if he could sub "Harry put it in his pocket" and she said no. She then wrote the "Harry pocketed it" phrase into every subsequent HP book, just for giggles. I very much enjoy spotting them when I read to DD.

About three or four books in, there’s a sly mention of the fact that Strike’s meandering childhood allows his accent to slide seamlessly from Cornish to London, to blend in. I like to imagine Robert Glenister getting to that line and thinking ‘You could have said that earlier, Joanne!’

I know, but I seem to remember another character asking if he'd lived in Cornwall because she could detect a trace of it in his vowels, which makes me think it was more subtle.

Impressed by those so far into IBH. Mine arrived on 1st September and I'm kind of cherishing it chapter by chapter. The characters are just fab. She is such a great writer. When it feels the world has gone mad, it is so nice to have an old fashioned hardback which contains considered narrative about real life relationships, mysteries, interactions etc. to lose yourself in. It is right now, for me, how I escape from all the crazy.

Well he was partly brought up in Cornwall, undertaker. Maybe it was that accent that stuck

I must admit I've not read any JKR except the odd Harry P when I was younger. i hadn't actually realised how many others she'd done - I watched the TV 'The Casual Vacancy' but not been moved to read any others, but that will change!

Robert Glenister is one of the few male narrators I like. So many of them adopt these slightly shrill, irritating voices when they voice the female characters, but he never does. Though I always imagine Strike to be a bit more Cockney rather than the weathered Cornish fisherman that Glenister does.

Thanks, I'll let you know how I get on 😁