Rowling-Galbraith has suggested that the Strike series of ten books will end before the Covid lockdowns of 2020, which gives an endpoint to the series as plotted currently.
Given how ‘on board’ the author was with the ‘Save the NHS’ messaging, the huzzahs for the medical professionals who participated in the Covid-19 pandemic, and her enthusiasm, even cheerleading, for mRNA inoculations, I have to wonder if this deadline of convenience has less to do ultimately with the difficulties of writing a detective story during London Lockdown than the commitment of the Guilty to ‘forget’ their part in the nightmare of the last three years. “Don’t Let Them Get Away With It.”
Personally I don’t see how anyone could write a detective story that happens during a pandemic when were folks confined to their homes for months. Ending the Strike/Ellacott series before Spring 2020 makes perfect sense to me. Do people want to forget the pandemic? Undoubtedly. Was it mishandled? Certainly. Will we learn from this? That is hard to say. This last week I’ve read articles referring to medical research claiming to prove that Covid is spread by touch and that disinfecting things to prevent spread was ineffective. Until we have more distance and rational analysis we won’t be able to draw lessons from the experience. I am certain that there were a lot of brave people (medical, the post office, grocery store clerks, delivery folks) who stepped up and helped us get through this. I’m also certain a lot of people took advantage of the situation to increase their own power over us. I cannot say that one author not writing a mystery set during the 2020-21 pandemic means they are dodging responsibility. That’s taking things too far.
Tangentially, considering “the difficulties of writing a detective story during London Lockdown” might compare with those of the war being waged by Riddle and the ‘Death Eaters’ – a challenge embraced!
I have absolutely no idea what this might be about.
Who is the author?
Why do we care what might connect her to Covid?