|
|
Ron Miller's DARK CORRIDORS VOL. 10, No. 29 |
|
"THE GIRL WHO PLAYED WITH FIRE"  |
Sequel to 'Dragon Tattoo'
equally packed with thrills
of TheColumnists.com
No thriller has been anticipated so much as "The Girl Who Played With Fire" (Knopf, $25.95), the sequel to Stieg Larsson's phenomenal best-selling thriller "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo," which carries on the dramatic saga of Lisbeth Salander, the most original new "detective" character so far in the 21st century.
Well, I won't keep you waiting for my opinion: It's a knockout, leaving me literally panting for the upcoming third novel in the trilogy--"The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest," which we'll get in 2010, if everything goes according to plan.
If this is the first you've heard of Lisbeth Salander or Stieg Larsson, be aware that they're the core of perhaps the most bizarre publishing sensation that's taken place in my lifetime as a mystery fan.
Larsson was a renowned foe of right wing extremists, especially racist Nazi organizations, and fought them openly as a journalist who was editor in chief of the Swedish magazine Expo. A widely-read writer in Scandinavia, Larsson quietly wrote his first three novels about Lisbeth Salander, delivered them to his publisher, then died of a massive heart attack in 2004 while still a relatively young man.
Normally, first-time novelists don't fare so well with publishers. First-time novelists who drop dead and aren't available to help promote their books generally are never heard of again. But Larsson's first book in this trilogy turned out to be so fabulously suspenseful and original that it became a monstrous international best seller. The movie version of "Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" is already finished and being seen in Europe. America is just now beginning to appreciate what a fantastic legacy Larsson left behind for mystery fans.
In the first novel, we meet Mikael Blomkvist, an investigative reporter who's also the publisher of the Swedish magazine Millenium. He loses a libel case after he has tried to bring down a powerful corrupt business tycoon with a series of articles and faces financial and professional ruin. Hired to look into a long dead police case about a missing woman, he unravels a complex mystery case and, in the process, uncovers new evidence against the corrupt industrialist that he hopes will redeem his reputation and save his career.
The key to his investigation is his discovery of Lisbeth Salander, a young computer genius he's persuaded to hire as an investigator. Still in her 20s, Lixbeth is a small, almost anorexic-appearing girl with anti-social attitudes and a penchant for body tattoos. Legally incompetent to handle her own affairs, she has been under the control of a guardian who has sexually abused her and turned her even more against her fellow man. And yet this doll-woman, who's almost impossible to get close to in any way, is really an instinctive investigator with a brilliant mind and virtually limitless skills at searching out details.
In "The Girl Who Played With Fire," we finally learn all about Lisbeth's warped childhood and why she became so angry at the world that she was in trouble from the moment she entered grade school. Her past comes out in a most bizarre fashion: She becomes the chief suspect in three violent murders and is the subject of intensive searches by the police, by the security company she used to work for, by Mikael Blomqvist, who believes her innocent, and by a monstrous freak of a man with the strength of a giant and a medical condition that renders him insensitive to pain.
This big book--more than 500 pages--rockets along like a runaway train and there isn't a single, solitary dull moment in all those pages. The finale is so gripping that you may need at least a one-hour "cool down" period after finishing it.
Lisbeth Salander is like nobody else you've come across in mystery or suspense fiction. She's sexually ambidextrous and, despite her frail appearance, is so well-schooled in defensive techniques that it's a sheer pleasure to await what happens when two hulking male bikers decide to pummel her around a bit before turning her over to their boss. She can hurt you in so many ways!
Lisbeth has few friends, but they're choice. Her closest "girl friend" is Miriam "Mimmi" Wu, a Chinese lesbian with the skills of a kick boxer. One of her male friends is a retired heavyweight boxer named Paolo Roberto, who's still in fighting shape and winds up in the battle of his life trying to save "Mimmi" from the 6 foot 6 German giant named Ronald Niedermann, a brute whose specialty is breaking the necks of his victims with his bare hands.
She also is so adept at hacking into people's computers that she has created several alternate identities for herself and stolen tens of millions to stock her various hidden offshore bank accounts. She also seems to be acquiring a bit of self-pride early in this second book, deciding she could look and dress a little better than she did in the first book. Heck, she even treats herself to a boob job, so she won't be mistaken for a fifth grader when she goes into the occasional cocktail lounge. You have to give her credit, at least, for trying.
Just a casual thumb-through of these first two novels makes you aware that Sweden may not be the land of wholesome-looking people that some of us may expect it to be. Both novels grovel in the underbelly of Swedish society and "The Girl Who Played With Fire" is replete with unpleasant activities conducted by wealthy Swedish men who like to play with young girls imported from the Eastern bloc nations and turned into sex slaves in Scandinavia.
Before he died, Stieg Larsson had outlined several more novels he intended to write about Lisbeth Salander. I can't imagine the saga will end with the third book in the trilogy. For one thing, we haven't yet met Lisbeth's twin sister, although we know she has one. I can't even begin to wonder what she'll be like.
©2009 by Ron Miller. The book cover illustration is courtesy of Knopf. This column first posted Aug. 10, 2009.
Ron
Miller is a former nationally syndicated television columnist
and the author of "Mystery! A Celebration," the official
companion book to PBS' "Mystery!" series.
You can comment on this column online. Please address your message to either "The Editors" or Ron Miller . To send an email, click here and don't forget to mention Ron's name: talkback@thecolumnists.com
|
|
|
Archives |
|
|