The Girl Who Played With Fire. By Steig Larsson

The Girl Who Played With Fire

Steig Larsson

Translated from Swedish by Reg Keeland

Published in 2009 by Vintage Books. Originally published in Swedish in 2005.

The second book in the trilogy - the first was 'The girl with the dragon tattoo'. This book continues the story of Lisbeth Salander - a very engaging heroine.  This book showcases her physical combat skills, unlike the first book, which was more about her computer hacking skills. Mikael Blomkvist, of Millenium magazine, and his colleagues are planning an expose of sex trafficking in Sweden, when three murders happen. Two of the victims are the people who are writing the expose, and a book that would have been published simultaneously, the other victim is Lisbeth's guardian, to whom we were introduced in the first book. The police make the connection and are searching for Lisbeth as the criminal, but Blomkvist (and just one or two others) believe in her innocence. Unlike the first book, which had a mystery and crime that  did not involve Lisbeth except as an investigator, this one is all about Lisbeth, and involves her troubled childhood. The book starts off with the narrative from Lisbeth's viewpoint, but after the murders are discovered it shifts it's point of view, sometimes to Blomkvist, sometimes to the police, and only towards the end it comes back to Lisbeth's actions and thoughts. So for a large portion of the book, Larsson almost makes us believe that Lisbeth could have killed at least her guardian, if not the other two also. The book is nice, though a bit tedious in bits - for example there is a detailed description of the kind of furniture Lisbeth buys at IKEA. But towards the end, the pace is really hot. Lisbeth is revealed to have extra-ordinary combat skills which don't really gel with her physical description (thin, under five feet, etc.) or with her habits (no mention of any training or physical exercise but she eats poorly - mainly Billy's Pan Pizza, and is not averse to drugs and casual sexual relationships). So one might say that the integrity of Lisbeth's character is not preserved. On the other hand that very feature makes her somehow seem more human. It appears that Larsson wants to be as non-judgemental as possible, but as the story develops, Lisbeth's character is becoming more and more conventional. There are too many characters introduced throughout the book, almost to the end of it, and they have confusing Swedish names, so one kind of gets lost amidst all the Svenssons and Gustafssons and Erikssons. For all that it's a good read, and makes me look forward to the last book in the trilogy - namely 'The girl who kicked the hornet's nest'. I'll probably buy that this week.