I really liked this. I knew I would. The plot seemed long and boring, two things that I love in books. Rowling is clearly a master storyteller, it's evident in this novel. The plot was really captivating, I honestly could not stop reading. The novel overall reminded me of Hardy, you get this overview of a town and its large cast of characters. Obviously this isn't anywhere near the brilliance of Hardy but it echoes him well. 
 The problems that I had with this was that, at the beginning I felt that Rowling just dumped all these characters on you, expecting that you just individually remember each person. She must have thought, "oh I must get all of these character introductions out of the way so I can start the plot". Eh it was a bit overwhelming. Also the novel's a bit long. The plot does sag at parts and really can't sustain 500 pages. I felt that you could skim a couple of chapters and it really wouldn't make that much difference to the overall plot. 
 I liked this more than I liked the Harry Potters, I never really "got" Harry Potter. I really hope Rowling writes more novels like this. I'll definitely be buying more!