The book received a rave review in Publishers Weekly when it was released,which stated that “in a rare feat… Galbraith combines a complex and compellingsleuth and an equally well-formed and unlikely assistant with a baffling crimein his stellar debut.”

小说刚刚发行之后，就受到《出版人周刊》的高度赞扬，称其是：“罕见的杰作……盖尔布斯的首部小说就塑造了背景复杂、引人注目的侦探和同样见多识广的的专家，并将二者同令人困惑的犯罪行动完美结合在一起。”

When she first sold the rights to Harry Potter, Rowling was told to use thegender neutra

l initials J.K. instead of her first name Joanne, because bookswritten by men sold better. This time, she got to adopt an entirely male personawith a Scottish-sounding name, who was given a fictional biography by thepublisher:

当罗琳第一次出版《哈利波特》时，就曾被告知要用中性化的“J.K.”代替她的名字“乔安妮”，理由是由男性作家出版的小说销路更好。而这次罗琳完全采用了听着像苏格兰人的男性化名，甚至还给了出版商一份虚构的作者简介：

Born in 1968, Robert Galbraith is married with two sons. After severalyears with the Royal Military Police, he was attached to the SIB (SpecialInvestigation Branch), the plain-clothes branch of the RMP. He left the militaryin 2003 and has been working since then in the civilian security industry. Theidea for protagonist Cormoran Strike grew directly out of his own experiencesand those of his military friends who have returned to the civilian world.’Robert Galbraith’ is a pseudonym.

罗伯特-盖布瑞斯，出生于1968年，已婚，育有两子。在皇家宪兵队服役后被派往特别调查组，属于宪兵队便衣组成员。2003年退役后在公共安全局工作至今。书中主角“CormoranStrike”的故事来源于作者自身经历和其回到普通社会的退伍军人好友。“罗伯特-盖布瑞斯”实为化名。

It was reported in 2007 that Rowling had been working on a detective story,but these reports were later discredited.

2007年就曾有报道说罗琳正在撰写侦探小说，但后来这些报道被证明是假消息。