Cormoran Strike is a series of crime fiction novels written by British author J. K. Rowling, under the pen name Robert Galbraith.
The first novel, The Cuckoo's Calling, begins with Strike being hired by John Bristow, the brother of adopted supermodel Lula Landry, who had fallen from her balcony three months previously.
Near the first book's end, after solving the Landry case and before Robin is ready to leave for a permanent position elsewhere, Strike gives her the gift of a green silk dress she had previously tried on at the Vashti boutique as part of their investigation.
Owen, once hailed as a literary rebel, has struggled for years to recreate the success of his original novel and has fallen out of public favour.
The package is accompanied by a note quoting from the Blue Öyster Cult song Mistress of the Salmon Salt (Quicklime Girl), a lyric Strike's mother Leda had tattooed above her pubis.
Strike and Robin work out that the sender of the leg is also responsible for a number of other brutal attacks and reaches public infamy as the Shacklewell Ripper.
Later, Robin makes a decision while investigating one of their suspects that has profound and shocking consequences for their relationship, as Strike fires her and she then heads off to marry her fiancé Matthew.
Strike sets a successful trap to catch the Shacklewell Ripper and is driven by a friend early the next morning, arriving at the conclusion of Robin's wedding ceremony at the end of the novel.
A year later, the agency is hired by a government minister to investigate and stop an attempted blackmail against him, although he will not tell Strike or Robin the details of his actions.
Both are dealing with their own irritations: Strike over his aunt's illness, suicide threats from his ex-fiancée Campbell (now a married mother of two) and the attempts of his half-siblings to get him to attend a party honouring his rock star biological father Johnny Rokeby; Robin over Matthew's intransigence in their divorce, her continuing PTSD and her unsettled personal life, brought into clearer focus by her brother and his wife having their first child.
While visiting his dying aunt Joan, Strike is approached by Anna Phipps, who wants to hire his firm to investigate the disappearance of her mother, Margot Bamborough, a general practitioner in London, almost 40 years previously.
Strike induces him to confess to one of the last unsolved murders he was long suspected of, before revealing he has already deduced the identity of Bamborough's real killer.
Having tipped off the police about Creed's victim, Robin locates and uncovers Bamborough's remains, whilst Strike apprehends her killer.
Robin is approached by Edie Ledwell, the co-creator of a popular animated web series titled The Ink Black Heart.
Robin and Strike then receive a request to investigate the case made by those at the production company who are planning to turn the franchise into a feature film.
In the course of their investigation, they discover that the game has been infiltrated by members of The Halvening, a far-right terrorist group which mainly harasses left-leaning women online, often with the goal of trying to drive them to suicide.
They eventually discover Anomie to be the teenage son of one of those associated with the production and capture him in a violent confrontation in which he threatens to rape and kill Robin and seriously injures Strike.
Anomie turns out to be a disgruntled fan who was attempting to exert control on the production and was aggravated by the decision to move The Ink Black Heart from YouTube to Netflix and to make a film.
Their client's autistic son, Will, has lived in the UHC grounds for four years, emptying his trust fund into their accounts and not even leaving for his mother's funeral.
Eventually they dismantle the church's central myth of the 'drowned prophet' and with the police's help find evidence of several bodies and child trafficking and the charges against Robin are dropped.