The Girl Who Played with Fire
by Stieg Larsson
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Book Reviews of The Girl Who Played with Fire
Book Review: Better than GWDT but still in need of good editing
Summary: 3 Stars
Deadly Secrets
Having been disappointed with GWDT on many levels, I found GWPWF much more satisfying and less frustrating to read whilst also finding it retains many of the "annoying" characteristics of GWDT.
On a positive note, it is the main characters continue to be developed very well, especially Salandar (who is at the end of day the central character) and the story develops well (apart from Caribbean incident which I have to assume has something to do with third book - if not what the hell is it doing in this book?).
However, there are way too many characters at some stage (especially police) in the book and the interchanging in same paragraph of reference by first name and then surname can be confusing. There is also, especially towards the end, quite a lot of repetition of previous actions from another characters POV which I think is often unnecessary - although I can see why Larsson may have felt the need to re-explain/summarise what had been going on as the plot is quite convoluted.
I also got no feel whatsoever of the locations constantly being referred to, i.e. no descriptions of buildings, surroundings (except Salandar's new pad!) and there are just too many passages describing movements within Stockholm which at the end of the day are meaningless unless you know Stockholm very well. I also only got a real sense of what time of the year this was happening towards the end when the spring weather is referred to.
As with GWDT, some passages describing actions are just too long and become tedious, e.g. Holmberg taking inventory of flat.
There are also some unusual "coincidences" which serve to help story along, e.g. Salandar seeing Bjurman in Café Hedon and Blomkvist happening to be passing Salandar's apartment early in the morning and seeing her being attacked. At 120Kg Lundin is described as fat so strange that he can outrun Salandar - bikers such as him are not renowned for being fit. Also Blomkvist "being astonished at how empty the streets in Stockholm were at 3.00am on a Sunday night" - I would expect them to be empty!
The "description" of the computer's contents is strange - "contained everything from software to letters, downloaded articles and PDF files" Well of course it would have software what computer doesn't? Describing content as "letters, articles and PDF files" is just strange to me - files are what are saved on computers.
Describing the "longest word" document as 128Kb is wrong - that is the SIZE of the file not necessarily the length of the document (which would be in pages or words). It could be bigger but shorter than another document i it has a picture or graphic embedded in it.
Then the amounts of money being mentioned for bonuses and deals do not seem to "coincide" in terms of "value". For example, Millenium staff get a 25.000 bonus which = 1 months pay but Lundin losses 100,000 on an arms deal and this is described as a BIG loss (yet makes 250,000 at least on each drugs deal). Finally the price for delivering Salandar is 10,000 - less than half a month's salary for Millennium staff!
Then, we get back to the unnecessary detail, e.g. Mac Powerbook, with 43cm screen, 120Gb hard drive and 1,000 MB RAM - who cares! Also how can Blomkvist power up Salandar's computer without a password - surely it would have one?
So in short, a better (more realistic, if still stretching the imagination in places) story then GWDT and we have a much better understanding of Salandar's character and the reasons for this (though having Aspergers is just not realistic - what she suffered, along with her "natural" character, would probably be enough to make her so introverted and wary/suspicious of authority).
Nevertheless, still, in my opinion, too long with unnecessary/irrelevant details and some plainly confusing/wrong information - computer contents and relative "value" of money and no sense at all of place.
Deadly Secrets
Book Review: No Better Than The First
Summary: 2 Stars
For whatever reason, someone long time ago said it was ill to speak of the dead. However, one cannot help to think that the reason that the Girl trilogy has become a worldwide success is because Larsson did die. It was a tragedy, struck down in his prime, and anything else that the publisher could come up with to sell these novels. I didn't know the man, but I am sure that he was a good man. From what his biography says he fought Nazis in Sweden. Good for him and good for Sweden.
However, none of that translates into being a good author. Death has a way of making the bad not seem so bad anymore. When the guy that was mean and never had a nice word to say to anyone drops dead he quickly becomes a better man. The same goes for authors. Most of us did not know Larsson, but when we read his books and read the dust jacket we are convinced that he was a good man and therefore a good author. Death has made Larsson an immediate literary sensation.
According to the website that was dedicated to him, Larsson wrote these novels for himself. It was a way to kill time and shake off the day. Maybe the general public was never supposed to see these novels. We will never know. But let's say that for the sake of argument he was going to try and get them published. I think that they would still be widely popular. Why do I think this even though I think the trilogy is subpar? To quote H.L. Mencken "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public."
It's true.
Fire is no better than the novel that preceded it. Why should it be? The story goes that all three novels in the series were taken from his computer after he died and then published. It's possible; it has happened in the past. John Kennedy Toole wrote A Confederacy of Dunces. It was only after he committed suicide that his mother found the novel. Long story short- The novel was published and he, Toole, won a Pulitzer.
However, there are differences between the two, not the least being that Fire is supposed to be a mystery. Dunces is a good read. It has an edge; a bite even. Most importantly, Dunces had an editor. Fire, like the novel that follows it and precedes it, was clearly printed as it was found.
At times Fire reads like a shopping list. At other times it reads like a memo without a letterhead. Larsson could never decided if he was writing a police procedural novel or something else entirely. There are too many directions that Larsson has tried to take in Fire and none of them seem to work.
Throughout most of the novel Larsson is busy telling us how great Salander is at everything or he is telling us how adamant Blomkvist is about clearing Salander's name or he is busy telling us in detail about the computers used in the novel. This is another problem with the novel; Larsson never shows the reader a thing instead he tells us everything. It gets old quick.
The only attempted hook is the repeated hints of what life was like for Salander before the "evil" started. I know that there are people out there that still want to read this trilogy so I do not want to give anything away, but when we do learn what the evil is and how it fits in the novel it comes off as cheap. It's a cute little tactic on Larsson's part that fails miserably and reeks of deus ex machina.
I have always been a firm believer that everything has its place. Some people love the Twilight novels, some people don't. Other people think that Jane Austen is the best writer ever and others do not. The point is that novels like this one, and the other novels in this genre, are for entertainment. Most people don't want to think when they are reading a novel. It's not why they cracked the book open. They want to stop thinking for a chapter or two a day. Others who are looking for a well-written mystery, a mystery that will make you think and leave you guessing, should look elsewhere.
Book Review: Review Based on C. Hitchens' Comments in Vanity Fair Magazine
Summary: 5 Stars
As a Christopher Hitchens' fan, I was nevertheless very disappointed by his review of Stieg Larsson's trilogy of spell-binding Swedish novels. They are about corruption in government, criticism of the Socialistic state of Sweden and it's courts, using Lisbeth Salanger as his protagonist. Also Larsson makes a point of exposing misogyny very often, and this is perhaps his biggest theme. What else would one expect from a self proclaimed Feminist whose first novel was originally named "Men Who Hate Women".
It occurs to me that Hitchens skimmed these books rather than read them closely, as he made many factual errors: i.e. Salander did NOT have Asperger's Syndrome, as Hitchens claims, rather it was only mentioned as a possibility for her condition but then was eliminated, ruled out. He also talks about her "return from the grave", which helps him de-personalize her into a cartoon like creature or Nordic god, as he seems determined to equate this very modern novel with Nordic sagas, and other pre-Christian mystical super human powers. Salander was shot in the side of the head, in fact, and a small amount of soil put over her, as her enemies presumed they had killed her, however, as a cliffhanger one sees in quite a few thrillers, she was only grazed by the bullet, so digs herself out, showing she is not some mythic troll or Flashman, but a real person coping.
Another thing that makes me wonder why he is so obsessed with Sweden as some very blond, Nordic holdout from the rest of the modern world is the fact that he says Wynona Ryder should play her in a Hollywood movie "except for the hair color", meaning blond. Salander is in fact brunette with "very black eyes" and her father, whom she is said to resemble, is an emigre from Russia.
He also bemoans the use of Swedish place names, but perhaps he forgets this was a Swedish novel, written in Swedish, with events occurring in Sweden.
He tries to make Sweden sound like a benign place on the surface, but in reality a racially charged secret port for Nazis, a place swarming with violent Neo-Nazis and skin heads. In the U.S. we also have our share of Neo-Nazis and violent skin heads, no more and no less percentage-wise than in Sweden, perhaps more in fact because of our racial tension in this country. He refers I think to the Hell's Angels Harley-Davidson Hog riding group that is paid by criminals in Sweden to try to kill Salander. Their dialog with Salanger is in fact extremely sexist and sexually homicidal, but not a word about politics, for sure.
As for "prurience" in the novels, this is simply not so, Hitchens perhaps being too obsessed by 1960 pornography such as "I am Curious Yellow", which he insists on mentioning. Sweden is a very morally conservative place today, so this film is irrelevant.
As for "All The Evil", which Hitchens dismisses as melodramatic drivel, this refers to Salander being the child of a drunken wife beater, who is also a hater of all females, and is an evil criminal whom Salander retaliates against finally at age 12, only to be put into a sadistic psych ward for some years, because her father must be protected by the government, here a small group of corrupt high level Security Council officials, as her father had been a secret, top Russian informant, given a new identity in Sweden, which secret is protected at any cost. Salander is damaged by this, but is a very human survivor, which is why the reader cheers her on.
Modern crime writing in Scandinavia is on the rise and is rivaling the English at its best. I suggest Ann Larsson of Sweden and Hoag of Denmark, but there are many more.
Linda Williams Standridge
Huntington, Massachusetts
Book Review: Salander's Third Theorem
Summary: 5 Stars
Stieg Larsson was born in 1954, was a journalist and an expert on anti-democratic and far-right organisations. He died suddenly in November 2004, shortly after delivering the manuscripts for three crime novels - known together as the Millennium Trilogy - to a Swedish publisher. "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" is the first part of this trilogy.
About a year has passed since "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo". Lisbeth Salander, having arranged a very healthy income at the end of that book, has spent much of her time travelling. As the book opens, she's relaxing on Grenada; however, no-one in Sweden has any idea where she is. Dragan Armansky, her boss at Milton Security, has more or less assumed she's resigned while she'd broken off all contact with Mikael Blomkvist before leaving. Blomkvist was both baffled and disappointed, though Salander had seen herself as a woman spurned.
Salander's had a very difficult life. It would be easy - and foolish - to dismiss her based on first impressions : she didn't finish high school and has no formal qualifications, has several piercings and tattoos and is barely five feet tall. However, she's highly intelligent, has a photographic memory and is a supremely talented hacker. She's very resourceful and also knows exactly how to handle herself in a dangerous situation. However, she's an exceptionally private person and comes across being rather cold and detached. (Although some suspect she may have Asperger's Syndrome, she has a very limited number of friends - and some at Milton positively despise her). She was institutionalised in her teens - after "all the evil" happened, when she was 13 - and is still classified legally incompetent. Her mother's dead, and her father's identity is officially unknown - so a lawyer, Nils Bjurman, officially makes decisions on her behalf. (Salander, of course, is more than capable of looking after herself). Bjurman is a nasty, sleazy and corrupt individual, who viewed Salander as his own personal toy - something to use as he pleased. Although Salander has managed to turn the tables - she has an extremely personal video that could ruin Bjurman - the lawyer has had enough to doing as he's told. Now, he's planning to have her dealt with...in a very conclusive manner.
Meanwhile, all is going well at Millennium. Having been approached by a freelancer, Dag Svensson, the magazine will devote a themed issue to human trafficking and the sex trade. Svennson is offering an article for the magazine, a very detailed book and a wealth of research. His girlfriend, Mia Johansson, has spent some time researching the same field as the basis for her PhD research. However, where Mia focussed on the girls involved, Svensson has been focussing on the "suppliers" and the "clients"...and the results feature some very interesting names. (While they have journalists and policemen, there's a mysterious character called Zala they can't quite pin down. However, he appears to be a terrifyling character.
Although Salander now has a low opinion of Blomkvist, he still thinks well of her - for a long spell, he checked on her apartment, and tried to re-establish contact. They finally do re-connect in "The Girl Who Played With Fire" - although not in the circumstances either would have hoped...
Another cracking book - though one that, like its predecessor, can occasionally make for uncomfortable reading. The events of "The Girl Who Played With Fire" are as difficult emotionally and psychologically for Salander as they are physically - with any number of people raking through her past, and newspapers speculating about her private life. However, it also means that we learn a great deal about Salander's past...Absolutely recommended.
Book Review: Surprisingly better than the original
Summary: 5 Stars
How do you top a book that was excellently plotted, filled with memorable characters and an intriguing mystery? Apparently, by changing up the formula, filling out the already great characters with even more character and spinning a mystery that's more devilish, more immediate and more character-driven than before. In The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Stieg Larsson created an excellent book that marked the beginning of a great author whose life was cut tragically short. The Girl Who Played with Fire cements his status as a premiere thriller writer. For those who haven't read the first book, beware because this review will obviously discuss the first book.
At the end of Tattoo, our two characters Blomkvist and Salander have had a falling out and haven't spoken to each other. Meanwhile, Bjurman, the evil sadist who was a minor yet insidious character in Tattoo, is still fuming over Salander's way of getting back at him by branding him as the sadist he is and holding onto a tape documenting his evilness. The Girl Who Played with Fire starts out with a few different story strands like Tattoo. Also, like Tattoo these apparently divergent stories end up colliding in shocking ways. You have Salander's mysterious story, Bjurman's attempt to get rid of Salander on one hand. On the other, there's the Millennium paper side of things that is going to publish a book on sex trafficing that will expose a variety of members in Swedish culture as being a part of it. The stories converge in a shocking sequence of violence that propels the rest of the story forward.
Unlike Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire's story is much more immediate and character driven. It delves more into Salander's character and answers many questions fans will have had when they finished the first book. It's also much better paced and written. One of the complaints I had about the first novel was that a lot of paragraphs had poor transitions into each other, making some sections feel more like vignettes than an interconnected story. Fire plays out much better and the transitions were much smoother. One area that tended to break my connection to the story were sometimes stupid characters. At times, characters do thinks that seem to be more for the sake of moving the plot forward than for anything realistic. Sometimes obvious clues are missed and other times the characters (particularly the police) seem completely ill suited for their jobs. That said, character development for Salander is front and center, this time, and her story is one with quite a few little twists and turns. Unlike Tattoo, where I figured out the central mystery pretty quickly into it, Fire surprised me multiple times in the direction it took. My recommendation is to know as little about the story as possible and just let it take you along its tumultuous journey.
I was really surprised with The Girl Who Played with Fire. It upped the ante in terms of storytelling and pacing and presented some shocking situations that really sold me on Larsson's ability as an author. I also really enjoyed Larsson's framing of the story as an algebraic equation. Much like his use of statistics for the previous novel, Larsson uses an algebraic equation to introduce the sections and while it's not as obvious a connection as the stats, it becomes an ingenious framing device that sells the ending. Like Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire deals, once again, with Men Who Hate Women (as the Swedish original title indicates), but it tackles it in a larger purview. An excellent read and a startling critique on Swedish society, it is a powerful thriller and one I'd recommend without a single reservation.