The Casual Vacancy (J.K. Rowling)

Lot's of characters and lots of juicy gossipy dysfunctional family stuff with a background of political slime; and class elitism and drugs and fowl language Oh My! In a nutshell, this is a big book just like the little blurb insists and it's full of lots of stuff going on, not a dull moment. I really got into it. I am so tired of reading reviews, split between the ones expecting more Howarts and the other saying that they're so glad it wasn't more Hogwarts. I fall into the latter camp, not that I don't appreciate Harry Potter and all his Potter-ness but I didn't read past the first book. It's not my thing. Now this one is more my thing. The Casual Vacancy centers around one Barry Fairbrother, specifically his death and all the lives he touched and the aftermath of a town called Pagford and it's connected, The Fields and Yarvil. He was on the Parish Council and now there is a 'casual vacancy' and people, the main characters of this novel are wanting to fill it to fulfill their own ideals of what a town should. And of course it's of no noble cause. We have the children of the main characters who have their own grudges against their parents and their prejudices and their yearnings to be free or understood or at least left alone. We have marital infidelities and unrequited love and a woman who lusts after a boy band. It's full of dark humor and reflects the human condition in every scene. I loved how perfectly crafted and how much of a story it was. It didn't seem like it could be real. I did have some issues with the ending and how, without creating a spoiler, one of the characters was done away with without much reason but it didn't affect my enjoyment at all. What did bother me a little bit was all the hype and secrecy of the book. There are no acknowledgments and that just comes across as stuffy and pretentious but i really loved the book. And that's what's important. I hope for more non-wizardry from ms. rowling.