The Casual Vacancy (Paperback)

This is a wonderful novel. JK Rowling's skills as a storyteller are on a par with RL Stevenson, Conan Doyle and PD James. Here, they are combined with her ability to create memorable and moving characters to produce a state-of-England novel driven by tenderness and fury - Melvyn Bragg, The Observer

A needle-sharp and darkly comic expose of today's class-ridden society . . . A highly readable morality tale for our times - Emma Lee-Potter, Daily Express

The Casual Vacancy is a stunning, brilliant, outrageously gripping and entertaining evocation of British society today. [J.K. Rowling] has done a rather brave thing and pulled it off magnificently - Henry Sutton, The Mirror

One marvels at the skill with which Rowling weaves such vivid characters in and out of each other's lives - Christopher Brookmyre, The Daily Telegraph

Heartbreaking - turning the page seems unbearable, but not as much as putting down the book would be - Deepti Hajela, Associated Press

An exquisite and occasionally moving black comedy . . . The acid test - I suspect it would do well even if its author's name weren't J.K. Rowling - David Robinson, Scotsman

A big, ambitious, brilliant, profane, funny, deeply upsetting and magnificently eloquent novel of contemporary England . . . This is a deeply moving book by somebody who understands both human beings and novels very, very deeply - Lev Grossman, Time Magazine

Insightful, meaningful, daring and resolutely challenging to tabloid assumptions regarding the moral worth of individuals - Scotland on Sunday

The action bowls along compellingly, most of the characters are vividly drawn and there are some sharp - often very sharp - observations about their social pretensions . . . a bold and distinctive effort - The Sunday Telegraph

This is a novel of insight and skill, deftly drawn and, at the end, cleverly pulled together. It plays to her strengths as a storyteller - The Economist

The Casual Vacancy is a brilliant novel, entertaining, intelligent, moving, passionate and hard-hitting; touching on familiar subjects but approaching them with great originality and skill. Moreover, it's unputdownable . . . The novel is a triumph - Irish Times

Rowling is a great storyteller with a clear eye and a warm heart, and The Casual Vacancy is a moving and immensely pleasurable novel - Sunday Business Post Ireland

Wrestles honourably and intelligently with big moral and political questions . . . a study of provincial life, with a large cast and multiple, interlocking plots, drawing inspiration from such writers as Trollope, Gaskell and, perhaps most of all, George Elliot . . . [the plot] is big, engrossing, and runs like clockwork - Guardian

Rowling weaves a web of connections that resonate long after the book ends - Daily Express

This is a book with a social conscience . . . Much lurks behind Pagford's idyllic facade - The Times

Rowling once again shows her skill at laying bare the best and (more often) worst of human nature - Star Magazine

A perfect holiday read - Best Magazine

JK's first grown-up novel is an eminently-readable tale of small minds in small-town England - Bella