Will I love Case Histories?

I love Jackson Brodie in every book of the series, but this is the first.

Brodie, a likable roughneck who sometimes works as a private investigator and who used to be a cop, solves three seemingly unrelated murders through a combination of intelligence and bumbling.

I finished the book in a single night, wowed by Atkinson and slightly in love with her main character. There is no mystery writer working today better than Kate Atkinson. Damn, she's good!  

I don’t want to describe this book as cozy, because it’s not, at least not in the “cozy mystery” sense of “yes, murders happen, but we’re not too troubled by them as readers.”

Truly terrible things happen to many characters in this book, and Atkinson really makes us feel them. Somehow, though, this book (and the subsequent entries in the Jackson Brodie series) is such a comfort read for me. I think a big part of it is the humanistic decency that informs the universe of the novel.

Also, Jackson Brodie is an outstanding straight man for the alternately grim… show more.

I recommend this book and the author’s fabulous writing, comprising of dread and humour (which I love), all rolled into one. Three separate case histories, interlinked, each littered with fabulous, memorable characters. Jackson Brodie, the Detective trying to solve the case, is one of the best, with brilliant detective skills and a haunting personal life.

An intriguing mix of family drama and mystery, giving it more depth than just an ordinary thriller. I have read this book many times, and it’s always new, never boring, and the ending is still a surprise.

All Kate Atkinson’s books are beautifully written, with wicked observation, but what I love about them most is the reality of her characters. 

None is more addictive than her detective, Jackson Brodie. I chose this book, not just because it’s the first in the series, but because it moved me so much. I have read it over and over again and each time it makes me cry. I want to take Theo, who still yearns for his murdered daughter, into my arms and comfort him. 

Like me, you will want to know what happened to the little girl who disappeared… show more.

Kate Atkinson has a serious talent for making a reader care about anyone she describes. She weaves deeply moving stories whether she’s telling us about grown sisters still caught in a tragedy from their childhood, a young mother driven to desperation by poverty and loneliness (and, yes, by being a young mother), or the detective who tries to find closure for them.

I couldn’t get enough of these characters and gladly followed them to the next books in the series.