Sooooo....I keep coming back to Bob Lefsetz and his blog and email streams. He is linked on the Diner review home page now and I do not follow anyone, simply because no one is as interesting as me... other then maybe this guy. I will devote another blog to him but he kept touting this guy Stieg Larsen and the series of books that start with "The Girl With the Dragon tattoo". I had picked it up in the book store in hard back and set it down. Murder mystery, Sweden....yawn. I do not know any Sweedish authors. I don't want to know them. What could they have to say to me? Murder mystery? Seriously?But when Lefsetz touts it...over and over again....referring to it as a club that only the readers understand.... well then that appeals to my inner and outer snob. I indulge that snob, a lot. Sometimes it leads me to crap but this was a really interesting read. Part financial thriller and part murder mystery and part portrait of a rich, hugely dis functional family it becomes really hard to put down. Our male lead is guy named Mikael Bloomkvist. This is the first problem with Swedish authors, they use Swedish names. The nerve! Bloomkvist is an investigative journalist, hip magazine publisher and his life has fallen in on him through a messy story and a libel verdict against he and the magazine. he is ruined.
he is approached by the scion of a wealthy industrial family to investigate the disappearance of an heir 30 years before that hangs over the family. His female protege, the girl for whom the book is named is a private investigator, computer genius with extremely bad brain chemistry, more then a little sociopathy and a troubled, deeply troubled family back ground and back story. I had read about 170 pages of the book (590 pages) when the movie came out.
I saw it advertised and knew this was supposed to be a hip and cool story and book (Why? Because Lefsetz said so) and so it was a Friday date night and I took my wife to see it at Frontenac. I like going to see movies at Frontenac. I like a cocktail with a movie. I like the older crowd. I like the whole thing. We got there and settled in and watched and it was good. I must warn you it did have the hated sub titles. I really hate sub titles but you could follow it. It is also fun to see movies without stars. Without people that you know and no star power and the actors were really compelling. The dragon tattoo girl appeared to be about an 87 pound psycho and she was perfect. Bloomkvist was too good looking by half, the way that William Hurt used to be.We watched until we got to the part where I had stopped reading and then things began to deteriorate as the girl is put into some extremely troubling and sexual abusive scenes. I had not gotten to these in the book yet. My wife is a nice person and literally cannot watch this stuff so she left and I came and got her when the scene was over and offered to leave but she was enjoying the movie so we stayed.... till the next scene...and then I got her again and she still wanted to stay.... until the next scene.... and then we had to leave. We were almost at the end, but it was just too much. Even for me.
Still the story was great and when I got back to the book I still found the story totally compelling. I have read some very graphic, troubling stuff but this was dark and cold in a way that could only be, well....Swedish. It is a great story and I highly recommend it as a read. I will be reading the next in the series which is "The Girl Who Played With Fire". But I will wait a little. Miss the movie. It should be out of the theatres already.
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