The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson
Synopsis (from Amazon.com): Cases rarely come much colder than the decades-old disappearance of teen heiress Harriet Vanger from her family’s remote island retreat north of Stockholm, nor do fiction debuts hotter than this European bestseller by muckraking Swedish journalist Larsson. At once a strikingly original thriller and a vivisection of Sweden’s dirty not-so-little secrets (as suggested by its original title, Men Who Hate Women), this first of a trilogy introduces a provocatively odd couple: disgraced financial journalist Mikael Blomkvist, freshly sentenced to jail for libeling a shady businessman, and the multipierced and tattooed Lisbeth Salander, a feral but vulnerable superhacker. Hired by octogenarian industrialist Henrik Vanger, who wants to find out what happened to his beloved great-niece before he dies, the duo gradually uncover a festering morass of familial corruption—at the same time, Larsson skillfully bares some of the similar horrors that have left Salander such a marked woman.
Release date: 2009 / 608 pages
First line: “It happened every year, was almost a ritual.”
Review: A few months ago, a request for discussion questions introduced me to this novel. Unfortunately, the book club needed them that night, and I had not yet read it. Then, as tends to happen, I started seeing this novel everywhere! So, I got at the end of a very long line at the library and waited.
Then, last weekend, I stepped aboard a roller-coaster of intrigue and suspense (and gruesome undertakings, ultimately). Tattoo is a good, old-fashioned thriller — at least I think it is, since I rarely read this genre… and “old-fashioned” isn’t quite accurate since the intrigue involves computer espionage and twenty-first century corruption ala financial and corporate big wigs behaving badly.
I thoroughly enjoyed the twists and turns of the plot and will definitely read Larsson’s second and third novels, too. Now, do I recommend this novel to book clubs? Not really. As I’ve stated before, I don’t really think mysteries or thrillers result in good discussion. The villians (and the good guys) tend to be 2-dimensional and the resulting plot rarely has shades of grey. But I don’t really think subtlety is the point of this genre. In fact, I think men in particular tend to like this genre due to the predictability of a clear-cut good vs. evil conflict that is so rare in real life. Actual conflict tends to be ambiguous and ambivalent, so escaping to more of the same is not always appealing.
So, if you are in the mood for a rolicking adventure story and a thoroughly engrossing escape, then give this a try. I do not think it will disappoint!
I loved this book (especially Lisbeth) but the second one in the series (called The Girl Who Played with Fire) was even better I thought.
The face to face book club I belong to has discussed a few mysteries and, generally, we’ve managed to have good discussions. Some mysteries tackle really interesting themes that can generate some debate. Even this book and the character Lisbeth in particular could generate some discussion about how societies treat its ‘outliers’ (for want of a better term for her).
So, what do you think of the international hype about this trilogy? I know you liked it, but is it really worth all the big fuss?
Thank you, Bernadette! You can tell that I rarely read mysteries! Good point about Lisbeth’s role in society and how she “creates” a certain amount of independence for herself, too. Once I read your comment, I started to think of other interesting relationship issues that would spark great discussion. Thank you!!
Gnoe — Honestly, this is one of those books/situations that I do not fully understand (internationally, financially, etc.). I do not know anything about Swedish financiers — but Larsson obviously did and was described as a “muckraker” so the impact this novel has had most likely has to do with who the characters represent in Sweden? I honestly do not know — but it was a great mystery, even without knowing any context…
What do you think?