What was the title of J.K. Rowling’s 2012 novel for adults?

The Casual Vacancy was J.K. Rowling’s 2012 novel for adults.

Published by Little, Brown and Company, the novel is set in the fictional English town of Pagford. Its story begins after the death of Barry Fairbrother, a parish councillor, creates a vacant seat on the local council.

The book examines class, poverty, politics, family conflict, and tensions between residents of Pagford and the nearby Fields housing estate. Unlike the Harry Potter novels, it is contemporary adult fiction with no magical setting.

The novel was Rowling’s first published work after Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. It was later adapted as a three-part BBC television drama in 2015. Readers sometimes confuse it with Rowling’s crime fiction, but The Casual Vacancy is a standalone social novel rather than a Cormoran Strike mystery.