The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

The Good – It would be hard to talk about the book and not talk about the series on Max (in America). I saw the series first and only just picked up the first book. I loved the series, I thought it was gritty without being over the top. I thought the acting was phenomenal. I thought the stories were compelling, with the right balance between the case at hand and the personal lives of the people involved. The book was great as well. The adaptation to tv really left Rowling’s voice in there and the characters were way more compelling on paper. I will be picking up more of the books!

The Bad – This is not for kids. I am a huge believer that if my kids can’t read it, I probably shouldn’t be reading it either. I will make an exception for the rest of these books. The use of vulgar language is only in dialogue and unfortunately would be used by the characters in those situations. The characters are also complex and nuanced in a way that isn’t appropriate for kids. For an adult reading it, it gives them a depth that is necessary and tragic all at once.

The Ugly – There is a part of me that understands the casual sex scene, but the bigger part of me just doesn’t feel like it added anything at tall to the story. It could have been left out and for my taste, it should have been left out. The fact that it is not only there, but revisited makes it worse. Thank goodness there wasn’t a ton of description or I probably couldn’t continue to read the books. Yes, I could see the character making the decision he made at that moment. The problem is, the decision and those actions added no value to the story. It didn’t even help me understand the character better because everything else that Rowling did in building that character was so fantastic. It just felt thrown in and forced. But, it was one thing in 400+ pages of a darn good story.