Newly Notable -- The Casual Vacancy

There's been plenty of buzz and excitement about J.K. Rowling's new book, The Casual Vacancy, but given the full-on publisher's embargo, reviews were unavailable until the book was actually released last week.
Book critics across the board are having a fairly unified reaction: it's not Harry Potter.  Some reviews are slightly kinder than others, but here's a smattering:
From The New York Times: "The reader can only hope [Rowling] doesn't try to flesh out the Muggle world of Pagford, but instead moves on to something more compelling and deeply felt in the future."
The Entertainment Weekly review was more overt: "When the novel finally arrives at its predictable and heavy-handed ending, what started as a lively comedy of manners has turned into a overwrought slog."
But Guardian out of the UK had a slightly gentler spin: "[it's] no masterpiece, but it's not bad at all: intelligent, workmanlike, and often funny.  I could imagine it doing well without any association to Rowling...it lacks the Harry Potter books' warmth and charm....but the worst you could say about it, really, is that it doesn't deserve the media frenzy surrounding it."
So there it is: it's not HP.  But I'm curious about our local readers.  Have you read it?  What are your thoughts?

Newly Notable: The Casual Vacancy

Speaking of people who are baaaaaaaack: you can now put a hold on J.K. Rowling's new book The Casual Vacancy.

According to her publisher, Little, Brown, the book is "blackly comic" and Rowling is now aiming for a more adult audience.  The publisher has offered the following description of the book:
When Barry Fairweather dies unexpectedly in his early forties, the little town of Pagford is left in shock. Pagford is, seemingly, an English idyll, with a cobbled market square and an ancient abbey, but what lies behind the pretty fa?ade is a town at war. Rich at war with poor, teenagers at war with their parents, wives at war with their husbands, teachers at war with their pupils…Pagford is not what it first seems. And the empty seat left by Barry on the parish council soon becomes the catalyst for the biggest war the town has yet seen. Who will triumph in an election fraught with passion, duplicity and unexpected revelations?
The worldwide release date is September 27--sadly, just in time to not make it onto your beach reading list.