4.25* 
 I will always love a good murder/mystery story and this one certainly delivered. The way in which each clue was woven together was quite interesting and I definitely didn't see all the connections until the very end. And I also wasn't able to predict who the real murderer was; it came as a real shock to me! This book had a "slow burn" effect for me in which I was left wanting to know what was going to happen, which clue he was going to be chasing next, and who the real killer actually was. "Robert Galbraith" sure has a way with words and descriptions that kept me going! 
 However, upon listening the book versus reading it myself lead to times that I was confused who certain people were or where Cormoran was as the time of the story. I know that this book is a little slower paced than your average murder/mystery which is totally okay with me, but it did lead to a few points in time that I zoned out and then "came back" and was a little confused about who Cormoran was talking to. This might also have had to do with the fact that there were quite a few different characters/suspects for him to make his way through. 
 I loved the character development in this book as well! I found it just as interesting to learn about the life of Cormoran and would love to hear more about him. (I couldn't care one way or the other towards Robin.)His strange life might make for a book in and of itself! Robin's character was okay and I understood why she was part of the novel, but I didn't really see her as someone essential to the story - hopefully this is added to in the next few books which I also plan to listen to as audio books.