Second Book Finished in 2011

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

The third and final book in the Millennium Trilogy Series. 

Having recently suffered from a bout of insomnia, I managed to complete this book within 48 hours.  I read the first two books, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and The Girl Who Played with Fire last year as was immediately hooked on the author who unfortuanately passed before he had the opportunity to finish the series.  According to a fan website the series had initially consisted of ten books in total.  I would have loved to see what this Swedish author cranked out in the future.

The book itself tied up a number of loose ends that had been plaquing me from the beginning when I was first introduced to Lisbeth Salander, the tattooed female heroine of the series.  The reserved, anti-social nature of this computer hacker was easy for me to indentify with, but I don't think it would be a problem for most women to identify with this character.  Stieg wrote about her is such a way that she encapsolated many of the vulerabilities that plague women on a daily basis.  He did this not only with his main charater, but with all of the supporting characters as well.  I believe that most men would identifiy with the male main character, Mikael Blomkvist, who befriends Salander in the first book, is cleverly portrayed as a saviour while at the same time allowing our heroine to remain just that.

Although Stieg goes over the background of our characters from the first two books, it's probably a good idea to read those first to get a true understanding.  In the first book it took me quite a while to get into the meat of the story.  The first couple of chapters dealt with Swedish finance and business dealings that almost completely lost me.  I stuck with it though, and the payoff was spectacular!!

In the following two books, it doesn't take long for Stieg to get to the point.  In fact, at the end of the second book, we leave our heroine Salander in a pool of her own blood having been shot three times but her father, once in the shoulder, once in the hip and once in the brain!  When I read that, I just about screamed!  I couldn't believe our heroine was being killed off this way even though I knew there was a third book, I couldn't think how he was going to save her.  Surprised again! Stieg came up with not only a detailed explaination but also a plausible one.

All in all, I loved this series and am very sad that I will not get to read more.  I give this book and the Series, 5 out of 5!