I'm not sure why I decided to read this book, except that I'd seen it everywhere, including on bestseller lists. Stieg Larsson's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo was not at all what I was expecting.
The over-arching mystery in this novel is one about a missing girl who disappeared forty years ago. Her uncle, still devastated by the disappearance after all these years, hires a disgraced journalist to dig through the clues in search of any new ideas as to what happened to his niece. The journalist, Blomkvist, is aided by a punk hacker, Lisbeth Salander. What they uncover is a family history filled with dark secrets and sexual crimes.
I can handle gruesome crimes. I can handle blood and vampires. It is very difficult for me to handle a rape scene as graphic as what was in this book. Call me prudish or innocent or unworldly, but I do not need to know that such perverts exist.
There were several such perverts in this novel. Really, why is this necessary? I can enjoy a good mystery but must we read about the details? I kept reading this novel because I wanted to know the outcome, that's all. I'm unsure whether or not I'll read the rest of Larsson's trilogy.
I had to laugh out loud at one point when, in the middle of the book, Larsson's played with the idea of religion as a motivating factor for these crimes. Suddenly, he sounded like Dan Brown, searching for those hidden Apocryphal texts... Uh, pick up a Catholic Bible and you'll find such "secret" books! Thankfully, that little interlude did not last long.
Just be forewarned if you decide to pick up this novel: there are gruesome things to come.
1 comment:
I've not read the books, but I've seen the Swedish film adaptation of Dragon Tattoo. If that stuff bothered you in the novel, I'd advise skipping the film. Yikes.
Post a Comment