I was reading the online New York Times a week or so ago and they discussed the literary phenomenon of the Millennium Trilogy by Stieg Larsson a Swedish author who wrote the three books and then died. His books became a posthumous best seller. I said “What, a best selling series that doesn’t involve vampires and whiny teenage girls.” How come I’ve never heard of it?
So I picked up a paperback copy and started reading. I was hooked. bad. It is a crime novel set in a small town in Sweden. It features Mikael Blomkvist a journalist who lost his mojo and a criminal libel trial and is facing a short prison term and his eventual sidekick, Lisbeth Salander, a computer hacker/investigator who Blomkvist suspects has Asperger’s Syndrome. Lisbeth is one tough girl. She is nobody to mess with. The original Swedish title of the book translates as “Men who Hate Women.” The guys that mess with Lisbeth eventually get their butts kicked, hard by this 90 pound woman.
Blomkvist is offered a job to solve a long standing missing persons case of somebody who disappeared from a small island in Sweden over 34 years ago. He starts on his investigation and things get very interesting very quickly then they get dangerous, very dangerous. This is one of those books you can’t put down. Or at least I couldn’t. It is full of intrigue and evil people, but no vampires and no whining.
I give this book four stars out of four. I have already bought the second book in the trilogy, “The Girl who Played with Fire,” on my Kindle. The Kindle price is the same as the paperback price, about $7.99 or so. I’ll do that. The last book in the trilogy,”The Girl who Kicked the Hornets Nest” is out in hardback now. It is under $10 bucks for the Kindle version so I’ll do that also.
I read this, and I was fascinated, too. Lisbeth’s personality was what really intrigued me.
I’ve also bought the second book and plan to read it soon.
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I’ll have to ask my son if he’s read this trilogy. My guess is that he has.
After looking through your blog I must say you take amazing photos! The vintage photos you scanned are excellent. I believe each one could have been used in a magazine layout. I’m thinking Life or Look magazine.
Have a great weekend!
Maybe I’ll have to go back to it. I couldn’t engage, the writing seemed a little dry, or detached or Swedish or something to me. I know it’s been very popular.
OK, I’m off to the library again! You do keep me busy reading when I’m not blogging!! I’m so glad we like the same kind of books! Have a great weekend!
Sylvia
Okay, I’m hooked.
Sounds well worth it. Thanks for highlighting this one.
I was really debating whether or not to start reading this book since I’ve heard so much about it, but I have a huge stack of magazines I still need to finish.
I’ve read the trilogy and thought it was totally brilliant. My only problem was getting my head around the Swedish names but that certainly didn’t spoil the telling.
So sad Larsson died before he knew he had written a world-wide best seller.
By the way, have you read the Kurt Wallander books – sorry I cannot remember the author but he’s also Swedish. The BBC have been showing the Swedish episodes on tv – you’re obviously a murder mystery sort of reader – my favourite genre.
I was hoping someone I knew would post a review of this book. I bought this for my Nook a few weeks ago but haven’t read it yet. I have heard its a great series. LOL at your vampire comment, currently I am reading a book about vampires of sorts (The Passage) which I know you would like. No vampire love story in this book. A bit sad though.