Breakaway Books

Authored by Robert Galbraith; Published September 2024; Mystery

⭐️⭐️⭐️ / 🏖️🏖️🏖️

I was warned, and it is worth repeating: The Hallmarked Man is long. As in, nine hundred pages, all of which are thinner than the norm to make the book feel more dense than thick. Frankly, dense is also a good descriptor for the mystery itself, along with “convoluted.”

The Hallmarked Man starts with woman of questionable stability approaching private investigator Cormoran Strike with what appears to be an odd request: Prove that the victim of a recent murder, which took place in the vault of a silver shop, is her (ex) boyfriend, with whom she recently had a child. Strike leaps into the case with aplomb, all the while trying to find ways to spend time alone with his business partner Robin, with whom he would like to be much more than business partners. Unbeknownst to Strike, Robin has recently suffered an ectopic pregnancy and struggles throughout the novel with her somewhat hot-tempered boyfriend, even as she follows Strike into the world of the Masons to solve the mystery.

I take one of two approaches when reading mysteries: Either I try to solve the crime right alongside the detective, or I sit back and let the mystery unfold. As tempted as I was to ingest every piece of information thrown at me in the deluge of this narrative, I opted for the second approach. I am confident that extensive note taking would have been required to get to the solution before Strike and Robin, who themselves admit that at the center of this novel is a particularly convoluted crime. Over the course of this one investigation, multiple instances of wrongdoing are discovered and put to right, and it does give the satisfying sensation of a 1,000 piece jigsaw puzzle fully assembled when every clue is matched to its crime. Throw in the masonic flavor, which is catnip for conspiracy theorists, and it has the allure of a complex mystery, if perhaps a tad too involved.

But any good fan of this series knows that the real suspense comes from the continual will-they-won’t-they of Robin and Strike. In every novel, we watch as the two perpetually misinterpret each other’s actions, convincing themselves that the other person couldn’t possibly long for them as they long for the other person. This kind of behavior doesn’t jive with my personality at all—I can only beat around the bush for so long before I take a more direct approach—but of course it builds up strong romantic tension even as it drives me crazy. In this book, though, Strike seems nearly Machiavellian in his repeated attempts to spend time with Robin alone and sell himself as a positive alternative to Robin’s boyfriend Ryan. I understood the mindset, but it struck me as a diversion from Strike’s normal character and a bit tiresome. I definitely was ready to take both of them by the collar at the end and shake some sense into them. (Also, could we please stop assaulting Robin in every novel? The poor woman is traumatized enough.)

If you have gotten this far in the Strike series, you will probably find The Hallmarked Man enticing and enjoyable! As for any progress on the Robin-Strike front in the end, I won’t spoil it—you’ll have to read for yourself.