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Sunday, November 7, 2010

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


I really loved this series, and the last book, this one, was the best. I am a life-long reader of the murder mystery genre, even though I rarely write about it (or talk about it, if it comes to that). I have never seen a murder mystery become so wildly popular. It is a world wide phenomenon. All of which is both sad and exhilarating. Sad because the author died very shortly after delivering the set of three books to his publisher, and exciting because it opens a whole potential audience to this genre--maybe other great writers will dabble in the medium as a result and the genre will be enriched. Also sad because this is it--the author had a vision of at least seven books, even embarking on writing the fourth, and if anything like the first three, they would have been intertwined, referring back to things that had happened before, consequences of previous actions coming to fruition or back to bite one in another volume.
The series features a dour, smart, world-weary editor who becomes entangled with a slightly autistic, highly traumatized young woman, and they form an unlikely team. They take on giants and they chip away at them. They have victories and failures. The novels weave the two of them into and out of the narrative in a manner that is both engaging and interesting. If you haven't already, pick up the series today. Then move on to the rich genre of Scandinavian mysteries.

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