The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest by Stieg Larsson

Mystery/Thriller

In the third and final book of the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo trilogy. We are wrapping up the Lisbeth Salander story. She was last shot and left for dead, but Mikael Blomkvist found her and got an ambulance called. Salander has a bullet in her head but it's operable and the doctors think they can save her. Even if she's saved though, the police still plan to prosecute her for a variety of charges. It's all a smear job and Blomkvist thinks he can help her save herself.

It has been a while since I read the first two books in the series so I was worried I would have forgotten too much to have this make any sense. The book does a good job of reminding what happened where the last book left off though, so I wasn't feeling lost. It revolves completely around Lisbeth's upcoming trial and attempting to save herself. Overall it seemed like a long book where not a whole heck of a lot happened (like why did Erika leave the paper and come back? How did that really drive the story forward?), but it was still interesting. I'm glad to be done the series but not sure I'll continue on with the other similar books.

First Line: @Dr. Jonasson was woken by a nurse five minutes before the helicopter was expected to land."

Rating:
(3.5/5)

The Girl Who Played with Fire

The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson
Mystery

Mikael Blomkvist, publisher of the magazine Millennium, has decided to run a story that will expose an extensive sex trafficking operation. On the eve of that publication, the author and his girlfriend are found murdered.

LIsbeth Salander has been traveling the globe spending some of the money she stole in the last of this series. She just recently returned to Stockholm and brought an apartment and car under an assumed name.

The police start investigating the murder and find the weapon with Salander's prints on it. The weapon had belonged to Nils Bjurnman, her guardian who was also discovered murdered. The only connection seems to be Salander and the police start to actively search for her.

Blomkvist refuses to believe Salander would be the murderer and sets out to do his own investigation.

This is a thriller which definitely involves the reader right up until the end and further sells the next book because of a cliffhanger. I have always wondered why Salander was so close-mouthed and private. These questions are answered and the answers provide the twists and turns of a great mystery.

First Line: "She lay on her back fastened by leather straps to a narrow bed with a steel frame."

Rating:
(4.5/5)

The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson

The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson
Mystery

Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist are back in the second novel of the Millennium Trilogy. Lisbeth is starting to make a small dent in the billions she stole in the last book by going on a year long vacation. When she heads back to Sweden, she buys herself a new place and doesn't let anyone except a few close friends that she is back in town. Blomkvist has been trying to get in touch with her for a while but to no luck.

Blomkvist and the Millennium magazine are working with an author to put out a book and entire issue on the Swedish sex trade. Many names are about to be uncovered and people exposed, when the author and his girlfriend are shot and killed. Blomkvist discovers the bodies and finds the murder weapon, which has Salander's fingerprints on it. They later also find Salandar's guardian shot with the same weapon. The manhunt starts for Salander but Blomkvist isn't convinced that she murdered them and sets off on his own investigation.

The first novel in this series was such a page turner, giving me high expectations for this book. I don't think my expectations were entirely met but the novel was still very good. The start of the novel was just a little bit slow but about a third the way through the book things started to pick up. There were good twists and turns in the book and I still enjoyed the chemistry between Blomkvist and Salander even though they were rarely together during the book.

First Line: "She lay on her back fastened by leather straps to a narrow bed with a steel frame."

Rating:
(4/5)

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson
Fiction/Literature

A middle-aged financial journalist Mikael Blomkvist has been sentenced to jail for slander. He is hired by Henrik Vanger, the retired CEO of a large family-owned conglomerate, to solve the mystery of his disappeared niece 40 years ago. She disappeared from the family island and now Vanger wants Blomkvist to investigate family and find out who is responsible for her death.

The girl with the dragon tattoo is Lisbeth Salander, an investigator for Dragon Armansky. She is incredibly details oriented and very very good with computers. But she is asocial and a ward of the state even though grown and her finances are controlled by a trustee.

Larsson has developed a story with a large number of characters, each with their own story. The Vanger family is immense and each had a motive to be involved in the mystery. Blomkvist is dogged in his following of a tidbit of a trail. He ends up hooking up with Salander who originally investigated him for Vanger. Blomkvist the humanist and Salnder the anti-social make a formible duo.

Larsson has written a brilliant story about women as victims and their rise above it. I will be looking for the next book in the series.

First Line: "It happened every year,was almost a ritual."

Rating:

(4.5/5)