What was J.K. Rowling’s pen name for her 2013 crime novel The Cuckoo’s Calling?

J.K. Rowling used the pen name Robert Galbraith for her 2013 crime novel The Cuckoo’s Calling.

The novel was published in April 2013 and introduced private investigator Cormoran Strike. At first, Robert Galbraith was presented publicly as a former Royal Military Police investigator, but the author’s identity was revealed later that year.

Rowling chose a pseudonym partly to write without the immediate expectations attached to her Harry Potter fame. The name allowed the book to be judged initially as a crime novel rather than as the next work by one of the world’s most famous authors.

The revelation prompted renewed sales and media attention. Rowling continued the Cormoran Strike series under the Robert Galbraith name, distinguishing those novels from her Harry Potter books and from her non-fiction and charity work. The detective is therefore Cormoran Strike, while Robert Galbraith is the authorial pseudonym.