The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Stieg Larsson)

Now before I give you my long list of excuses for taking so long on this book, let me just clarify that it’s the longest book I’ve read in awhile. No, but seriously, the beginning of May was all about cramming for finals, adjusting to a new job, and settling back home here in Bellevue. April on the other hand was crazy. It felt like almost every weekend there was something planned and the weekdays were just exhausting. March? Well, I’ll toss up March to laziness. 

For the past couple of months, I’ve been reading, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. If you’ve been reading my posts, you’ll know that there’s usually some story behind why I end up reading the book that I’ve chosen, this one is no different. Let me take you back to 8thgrade, my nosy self noticed that my Language Arts (English) teacher, was reading this book. I remember asking her what it was about and she got a little weird and said it was an adult book. Looking back, that’s definitely not what you should tell a curious middle schooler. I vowed to buy that book, just so I could read it and prove that it wasn’t for adults. To be clear, at the time, I thought she meant that the reading level of the book was too high for an 8thgrader, and I was quite offended. I finished the Harry Potter books for crying out loud, I could handle anything. So, imagine how amused I was when I bought the book so many years later and realized exactly why her response was what it was. If you’ve read this book, or have seen any of the movies, you understand what I mean. Those of you who haven’t read it, relax, it’s not Fifty Shades level, it’s more on the explicit language and violence side. In my own words, I’d probably start by describing this book as a mystery but that’s definitely an understatement. For lack of better words, let me show you what was on the back:

            “Harrier Vanger, a scion of one of Sweden’s wealthiest families disappeared over forty years ago. All these years later, her aged uncle continues to seek the truth. He hires Mikael Blomkvist, a crusading journalist recently trapped by a libel conviction, to investigate. He is aided by the pierced and tattooed punk prodigy Lisbeth Salander. Together they tap into a vein of iniquity and corruption.”

            I’ll be honest, when I read that, I was a bit intrigued but I was mostly confused. At that point, I also hadn’t seen the American version of the movie or the Swedish one so I had no idea what to expect, I was just determined to read it. The prologue of the book hooked me in right away, but being frank with you, this book went in and out for me. What I mean is, that at some points I was so fascinated by it that I couldn’t put it down and would finish 100 pages in one sitting. However, there were also parts that felt like they dragged on, so reading 10 pages felt like an eternity. In a mystery book though I think that’s completely normal, there are parts that seem boring or insignificant but later are very apparent to be relevant to the storyline. I am also a pretty impatient person so I’ll admit that about halfway through the book, I began watching the Swedish version of it on Netflix. I stopped watching when things stopped following the book because I was definitely confused. Anyway, I don’t want to say too much about it because I don’t want to ruin anything but in all honesty the end of the book literally made me go, “what?!” So yeah, I will absolutely be reading, The Girl Who Played with Fire.

Thanks as always for keeping up with my ramblings!