Reading in Reykjavík

I am about 90 pages into the English translation of the second volume in Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy, The Girl who played with Fire . It's a slow beginner, but the main storyline seems to be kicking off. I take grave exception to all the [insert expletive of choice] product placements in the beginning chapters of part 2. Who cares whether Lisbet Salander bought Bonde or Billy bookcases? Or what was the brand name of her sofa or her coffee table? It isn't even necessary to list what she bought - surely it would have been enough to say she went shopping for new furniture at IKEA and brought back just about everything she needed for her new apartment? The whole thing reads like a combination of an IKEA advert and instructions for a movie set designer. Earlier in the book there are several other such lists that, although not as heavy on the product placement, do make the book longer without mattering to the story. -- If anyone who has read the book in Swedish reads this,...

Some final thoughts on the book: I have rarely read a long mystery or thriller that didn't at least sag just a little bit in the middle, but this one does not. It does take a while for the central story to begin but once it does start rolling it never slows down until the almost disappointingly short climax is reached and the long denouement begins. That he was able to keep the reader's attention through a slow background setting and introduction of characters the length of a short novel and a denouement that is an almost self-contained story the length of a novella, shows that Stieg Larsson was a master of the craft of writing. This is a first novel but it shows no signs of firstbookitis, which isn't really surprising because Larsson was a veteran journalist and therefore an experienced writer. That he was a reader is obvious. Apart from the references to Astrid Lindgren that suffuse the story in the characters of Mikael and Lisbeth (who are his speculations on what Kalle ...

I got so engrossed in the book last night that I didn’t stop until my eyes were stinging from all the reading and it was past one o’clock in the morning. I stopped around page 410, which leaves me the last section of the book, about 120 pages. I hated to stop, as I had got to a very exciting part in the plot, with one protagonist in mortal danger and the other about to head into it. That there should be so much left of the book when the climax appears to be starting tells me that either the climax is going to be drawn-out, there will be a second climax, or the denouement is going to be a long one. Some thoughts about the plot: I really, really hope there is some real purpose to the horrifying abuse Lisbeth has had to suffer at the hands of her legal guardian. I would hate to think it was just a gratuitous addition to the book or a way to have her supply a small and not very important item to the profiling of the killer. It does emphasise that vulnerability that I mentioned earlier, tha...

I did say I was going to start journalling about Crime and Punishment , but as it happens I had to read this one first, because I was on a waiting list for it at the library and got it on “new book loan” which means I only have it for 2 weeks, so must finish it before then, whereas I can keep the other one for 2 months, and then get another copy if that isn’t enough. This is a long book, over 500 pages, so it lands itself well to journalling. I am reading the Icelandic translation. -- So, here are some thoughts about the book so far: The intro chapter is a very good hook which suggests that an intriguing mystery is about to unfold. It’s good that of the two leading characters Carl Mikael Blomkvist is introduced first, because he is the more conventional and less interesting of the two. Even the attempt to make him slightly less conventional by having him be involved in a ménage à trois does not quite work. If he alone had been the leading character, I would have expected this to unfold...