Name: The Casual Vacancy
ISBN: 9781405519229

The Casual Vacancy

When Barry Fairbrother dies unexpectedly in his early forties, the little town of Pagford is left in shock. Pagford is, seemingly, an English idyll, with a cobbled market square and an ancient abbey, but what lies behind the pretty façade is a town at war. Rich at war with poor, teenagers at war with their parents, wives at war with their husbands, teachers at war with their pupils…. Pagford is not what it first seems. And the empty seat left by Barry on the town’s council soon becomes the catalyst for the biggest war the town has yet seen. Who will triumph in an election fraught with passion, duplicity and unexpected revelations? Blackly comic, thought-provoking and constantly surprising, The Casual Vacancy is J.K. Rowling’s first novel for adults.

What Hacker News says

ScottBursonMar 2015

How about J. K. Rowling? She was on welfare when she wrote the first Harry Potter book:

“Harry Potter” author J.K. Rowling argues that there’s magic in government benefits. She stopped by “The Daily Show” to chat with Jon Stewart about her new book “The Casual Vacancy,” and delved into how government assistance helped her survive in her early years. “I couldn’t have written this book if I hadn’t had a few years where I’ d been really as poor as it’s possible to go in the U.K. without being homeless,” Rowling told Stewart. She added that “We were on welfare, what you we call welfare, I would call benefits, for a couple years.”[0]

[0] http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2012/10/16/j-k-rowling-on-how... (search Google for "rowling welfare" and it's the fourth result; there are others)

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snewmanJul 2013

Interesting that the reviews for this book were so much better than The Casual Vacancy. I wonder whether it is in fact better written, or simply that The Casual Vacancy suffered for having J. K. Rowling's name attached to it. (Expectations too high, people wanting to see such a high-selling author take a fall, etc.)

As for this being a publicity stunt: maybe so, but I wouldn't take that as a foregone conclusion. It's easy enough to see that she would want to get away from all the hype and noise and just write books. And it's not like she needs the extra income that this book might bring. (If she were simply interested in cash, she'd certainly do better to write more Potter-related material.)

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