Placeholder Post: Cormoran Strike Errors Corrected In Later Editions

As the Cormoran Strike series grows in length, complexity and number of readers, more and more errors are noticed by sharp-eyed fans. Just as with Harry Potter, some of those errors are being corrected in later editions.

This post is being compiled to both collect all Hogpro posts on book errors we have found, and as a place to report any corrections or changes readers spy in later editions. Please list in the comments sections.

MISTAKES: 

  1. Errors first noted in Cuckoo’s Calling.
  2. Errors from Lethal White.
  3. Errors from Troubled Blood. 
  4. The life and times of Donald Laing gets its own post. 
  5. Rowling/Galbraith is not good with dates. 
  6. I mean, really, really not good. 

 

CORRECTIONS:

  1. The most elaborate (and probably least necessary, since the will was still invalid!) correction was the addition of Aussie-Vashti-Saleswoman Mia Thompson to The Cuckoo’s Calling. This was the most elaborate correction seen in Ms. Rowling’s work to date, requiring the addition of a new named character and edits of multiple chapters.

2. One error caught quite early, and therefore present in only the first printing of Troubled Blood, was a continuity error when Strike and Robin were enjoying fish and chips in Skegness. Strike discovered he was out of cigarettes. He suggests buying some. Then, Robin is surprised by Gloria Conti’s message.  After their exchange on this topic, Strike “lights himself another cigarette.” Then, a mere few lines later, they “set off in search of cigarettes.”  This error was fixed in later editions of the hardback, the audiobook and the paperback.

3. The TB audiobook also initially changed the name of Strike’s oldest woman friend from Ilsa (“Ill-sah”) to Isla (“Eye-lah”). Thus was largely corrected in later editions.

4. Hogpro reader PerLish kindly pointed out that the “newborn Lucy” who was left in St. Mawes with four-year old Strike has now been amended to “2-year-old,” in the paperback version of Troubled Blood, making the siblings’ relative ages consistent with the rest of the series.

When I passed this information on to the Strike.fans Twitter group, participant @LudicrousMonica checked her Troubled Blood paperback and found a few others:

5. In Chapter 21, “Irene and Janice’s row” is corrected to “Irene and Margot’s row.”

6. The original chapter 36 had Cynthia Phipps offering to make coffee, then coming back and pouring everyone tea, then refilling Roy’s tea, then Roy taking “another sip of coffee.”  It has been corrected to be 100% tea. Note:  We missed this error in our summary post.

7. Thankfully, Robin is now remembering going to three funerals in her life. She first speaks of her grandfather’s funeral, when she dropped out of university.  Strangely, however, the following paragraph, about Rochelle Onifade’s cremation, still begins with “The only other funeral…” Mrs. Cunliffe’s services–and the fact that Robin nearly missed them–still don’t get a mention.  Rather bizarre; if you are going to correct it, why not do a full job of it? Surely space wasn’t an issue, after the wordage devoted to Mia Thompson?

Alas, Dave Polworth’s mother is still in Schrodinger’s Cat limbo. 

I hope this post will inspire holders of all the paperbacks to go back and take a look to see what else has been changed.  Please enter in the comments so we can maintain a master list.

Troubled Blood ‘Listen Along,’ Part Two: Premises for Reading Talbot’s True Book

Robert Galbraith’s twitter feed is sponsoring a ‘Listen Along’ for new readers of Troubled Blood. Last Saturday they posted two questions about the novels first fourteen chapters, Parts 1 and 2 of seven, and today, as you can see above, they’ve put up two more, these about chapters 15 to 27. That’s a bit of a weird break, as Part 3 closes at chapter 30, but I guess they have plans for a set of Christmas-themed questions for week three in this series.

If the aim was to generate online conversation among new listeners, the project in its first week was a fail. I was the only person who tweeted a response to their questions and my notes there were for re-readers to come join the conversation here about Troubled Blood‘s first two Parts. That pitch, it seems, and my seven posts here last week about Strike 5’s first fourteen chapters were also a failure, at least with respect to generating conversation; only one reader shared her thoughts about what I was writing all week.

I’ve decided, consequently, not to continue my chapter by chapter review of Troubled Blood, as much as I enjoyed writing those posts. @RGalbraith may have to continue playing a losing hand, but I can move on to more fruitful use of my time here. I realized last night while writing up some thoughts on Talbot’s ‘True Book’ that this bizzarro embedded text is the single most neglected aspect of Rowling-Galbraith’s longest novel and that, if I’m going to explore its depths and various meanings, I’d best do it before Ink Black Heart is upon us, a publication date only one month away.

My working premises for a reading of Talbot’s True Book as I begin are that (1) the book is indeed Rowling’s ‘True Book,’ her covert message about what happened top Margot Bamborough and who killed her, (2) Talbot’s tarot card spreads, the visible Celtic Cross lay-out and the three card spreads hidden in the various illustrations, are not random but Rowling’s deliberate choices to convey her meaning, and (3), in contrast, the astrological chart drawn for the moment and place of Bamborough’s disappearance, guided the choice of star signs for characters and their relationship. This last point is an especially difficult one to grasp or believe, I know, but the alternative, that she wrote the book and then found a time and place to match her story is preposterous.

So, next week, a close look at Rowling’s illustrated True Book inside Troubled Blood, an embedded text that may be The Presence’s most successfully covert bit of writing, a book within the book the characters struggle to understand but the readers of Strike 5 have thus far accepted at face value or at the level of Strike and Robin’s readings. I hope you’ll join me in Trelawney’s classroom for a reading of Rowling’s tarot card spreads and riffs on the Crowley-inspired deck illustrations!

Troubled Blood: Chapters 13 and 14

The last day of posting in a week of reviewing the first two Parts of Troubled Blood, chapters 1 to 14!

Today, I want to talk about the Walk from the Clerkenwell Clinic to the Three King’s Pub and then the finale of Cormoran’s first review of what he found in the Metropolitan Police cold-case file, the discovery of a secret message in code. It’s a strong finish to the introductory data dumps and foreshadowing in Rowling’s longest novel to date and it has some fun echoing of previous Strike mysteries for the die-hard fan to savor.

We’ll start with the long walk in chapter 13 from Margot Bamborough’s point of origin on 29 Clerkenwell Street to her supposed destination-never-reached, the Three King’s Pub.

Join me after the jump for the answer to that ‘Name The Chapter!’ challenge and a thought about the embedded clue to the mystery of both books hidden in the Walk! [Read more…]

Troubled Blood: Chapters 11 and 12

Home stretch for Troubled Blood, Part 2, chapters 8 to 14! Today we take a closer look at the very brief chapter 11, in which Strike is hit with a combination punch via text messages, and the more substantial chapter 12, Robin’s birthday reflections and trip to Selfridge’s to shop for a new signature scent.

In the discussion of chapter 9 yesterday I shared the question-and-answer relationship of Parts 2 and 6 in Troubled Blood. The short course is that the second Part spells out all the questions that have to be answered and introduces all the critical characters that must be interviewed for the story resolution in the sixth Part to be satisfactory. I mentioned briefly, too, in the super-challenging chapter 8 review, that Part 2 is a seven piece ring that has chapter 11 as its turn. Which it is! Join me for that and a little more after the jump. [Read more…]

Troubled Blood: Chapters Nine and Ten

After yesterday’s jump from the end of Troubled Blood’s Part 1 to Part 2, today we’re all in to the second Part’s foundation of the character story arc for both Robin and Cormoran. In chapter 9, Robin wakes up on her 29th birthday, reads about Creed’s 29th birthday, and, after an exchange with Strike, fumes that he has forgotten her birthday again. Strike interviews Dr. Gupta, Gandhi look-alike, in chapter 10. Both chapters are brilliant set-ups for their parallels in Part 6 and the denouement celebration of Robin’s birthday in the novel’s finale. On to the tweeted challenge-questions and my thoughts below!

The events of chapter 9 in sequence are, first, Robin’s morning reflections as she wakes up on her birthday, reflections that data dump all the reader needs to know about the status of her divorce case, her worries about being forever single and married to the job, and her new apartment and flat-mate Max. She showers, opens her presents, and travels to work reading The Demon of Paradise Park to cheer herself up. She receives two texts along the way. Mom sends a gift certificate or mad money to spend at Selfridge’s. Strike invites her to his interview with Gupta, an invitation she declines. She is more than a little disappointed that her partner makes no mention of her birthday.

Rowling here establishes Robin’s baseline for all that is to follow in her Troubled Blood dissolution and re-integration, all of it “astrologically correct.” [Read more…]