The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (Millennium, #1) in Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge

Jul 12, 2014 Sarah rated it did not like it · review of another edition

Shelves: dnf

3 chapters in and I am a) utterly bored by the endless financial, legal and political minutiae, b) amazed by the sheer depth and breadth of Armansky's patronising, possessive and misogynistic attitude towards Lisbeth Salander. Also, NOTHING HAS ACTUALLY HAPPENED YET.

Chucking this one on the DNF pile with 0 regrets. ...more

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Nov 08, 2021 Marcella rated it liked it

Shelves: fiction, 2021-100-book-challenge, murder-mysteries, translation

I read this about a decade later than everyone else, because I actually tried to read WITH everyone else when it first came out. Thinking it was a murder mystery with a black-wearing punk girl like the movies promised, I was surprised and dismayed to spend pages and pages reading about Swedish financial crimes I couldn't care less about. I put it down for over a decade, only trying it again when desperate to find something available on Libby very late at night. I've been getting through a lot of I read this about a decade later than everyone else, because I actually tried to read WITH everyone else when it first came out. Thinking it was a murder mystery with a black-wearing punk girl like the movies promised, I was surprised and dismayed to spend pages and pages reading about Swedish financial crimes I couldn't care less about. I put it down for over a decade, only trying it again when desperate to find something available on Libby very late at night. I've been getting through a lot of classics--or at least books that everyone has read--this year and I figured I'd try again.

I pushed through the financial crime chapters (so yawn) until I got to the wealthy family locked-island mystery. I entertained myself looking up pictures of the Swedish locales on google and learning a bit of Swedish on Duolingo. The procedural mystery itself is pretty good, with believable details and background information on Swedish Nazis and political history I didn't know about and found interesting (the Swedish prime minister was shot in the street, with witnesses, and they never figured out who did it?! Give me THAT book). What isn't good is the sexual violence subplot. I've read many many grisly sexual violence crime books over the years (far more I guess than many Goodreads reviewers who are S H O C K E D at this content), so it wasn't the content itself that upset me but the treatment of it. Lisbeth is...rather a manic pixie punk girl who is seemingly just fine after taking her revenge for a gratuitously described sexual assault . No hang ups left as she takes women (but she's not gay!! Or bisexual!! Just in case you thought she wasn't primarily an object of heterosexual male desire!! Despite her lack of womanly breasts which is mentioned on every other page!!!) or a much older man, who's barely interested, to bed. It's psychologically unrealistic, which breaks down the suspension of disbelief. In the same vein, Lundkvist doesn't contact the police when he's literally being shot at for...what reason? No good reason. Some of Lundkvist's and Lisbeth's interactions are stunningly cringeworthy. "You have beautiful eyes," he tells this woman minutes after meeting her. "So do you." Lord oh lord. I couldn't make up how bad it is.

Larsen namedrops some other mystery writers, which is how I learned about Ruth Rendell, and I'm glad he did. He also mentioned Val McDermid, who is muuuuuuuch better at sexual violence mysteries, and I recommend her for all your torture needs (warning: she will make this book look like a Pippi Longstocking fan fic which it clearly is anyway).

I guess this book will get you through an 18-hour flight to Australia, if it's all you have to read. ...more

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Jan 02, 2019 Kath rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: kathy

Slow thriller set in Sweden. Lots of facts, great characters, beautiful setting. Really held my attention. Didn't think it would get as violent and graphic as it did. So sad the author died before his books became so popular. ...more

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