Review: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo 
by Stieg Larsson

Published: 2008
Synopsis (GoodReads): Mikael Blomkvist, a once-respected financial journalist, watches his professional life rapidly crumble around him. Prospects appear bleak until an unexpected (and unsettling) offer to resurrect his name is extended by an old-school titan of Swedish industry. The catch--and there's always a catch--is that Blomkvist must first spend a year researching a mysterious disappearance that has remained unsolved for nearly four decades. With few other options, he accepts and enlists the help of investigator Lisbeth Salander, a misunderstood genius with a cache of authority issues.

--May contain spoilers--

I was swayed in two directions before I started reading this book. On the one hand I had my mum and sister telling me how poorly they thought of it, an opinion I respect because of the 1000s of crime novels my mum has read, and on the other hand there were the shining recommendations by authors I respect and other people (i.e. bloggers) that I've come to respect. I tried to keep this out of mind but when I started I couldn't help thinking that I should really enjoy this book because of the positive reviews it had received, and I felt like maybe I was missing something because I did not like it. Well not until 300+ pages in.

I found those first 300 pages hard to wade through. The writing was clunky, although that may a problem with the translation, there was tonnes that should have been cut out or edited down and I really had no emotional connection to any of the characters until Salander and Blomkvist started working together. Before that there were moments that caught my interest but overall it was a lot of work to force myself to keep going and finish the novel.

I like the premise of the disgraced journalist hired to do an internal family investigation and I like Salander's character as an eccentric and deeply disturbed PI (I refuse to associate her as Autistic, I think that was an error on Blomkvist's part) and as the story continued I grew to really respect and invest in their characters but it took far too long, especially in the first book of a trilogy spouted as being 'The best crime novels of all time'.

In other reviews I've read on GoodReads people have made excuses for the clunky writing saying because this is in the crime genre it doesn't need to be perfect. I'm sorry but I'm going to call bullshit!! That just goes back to the post I wrote the other day, it isn't allowed to be crappy just because it's genre fiction. There are some fantastic crime writers who do not make the same errors that Larsson does in his novel, which ultimately I'd conclude as being a rather amateur mistake of ignoring the golden literary rule Show don't tell. Larsson tells everything, he didn't let me gather anything about Slander's character by myself, instead I had it pushed down my throat exactly what she looked like half a dozen times and her inability to trust and her dislike of this and blah blah blah, her internal narration was not interesting enough to sustain that kind of flow of reveals. It was much better when you simply looked at her actions or through Blomkvist's eyes.

Finally I think the end of the novel petered on to long, after the resolution of the mystery and the action against Wennerstrom it should have finished quicker, instead we had to wander around with Salander again while she thought over her relationship with Blomkvist. I could have been quite happy if I'd stopped reading at page 520 or so. It was too much of a wrap up, 'oh we haven't heard from the original informant in awhile, let's have him send a christmas message', and 'let's have one final meeting with Vander where we'll discuss every percentage owned by the family and what outcome that'll achieve'.

Overall the mystery wasn't bad, in fact I quite enjoyed sifting through the red herrings which is one of the best parts of reading crime fiction, but a terrific middle doesn't excuse a terrible beginning and end. I think this book had the potential to be much better but ultimately I feel the same way I do about Twilight, that someone should have taken Meyer and Larsson's hands and taught them how to show, not tell and how to be a little ruthless and just chop away the unnecessary chunks of text. In both cases I think a much better book is hidden in the rubbish that has been left. I don't know if I'll read the rest in the series, I hate to start a series and not finish it, but I really don't think I can manage to get through another two of these books. Maybe I'll just watch the movies instead.

Rating: 2.5/5

Wishing you an early....

Merry Christmas!!!

 Eat, drink and be merry, sing some carols, open some presents and spend some time with the ones you love. I hope all of you having white christmas's have a magical day and to help ring the day in in style I give you a terrific carol sung by the current Doctor Who team. Enjoy!!

My Holiday reading list

I'm usually really terrible when it comes to taking books on holiday with me and end up with far too many taking up much needed space in my suitcase. This time I only brought two books up to Cairns with me and have been given a third by my mum to read as well. I think they're pretty varied so hopefully that means I won't be stuck with three books I'm not interested in all at the one time!

 No Hope For Gomez by Graham Parke

This is my light, comedic novel. I think it'll be ideal for the later part of the flights, train rides and downtime in the hostels, simple enough that I don't have to put to much brain power into deciphering meaning yet humorous and interesting enough that it takes my mind off the doldrums of travel and makes the time pass enjoyably.

The Plague by Albert Camus

This will likely require a little more attention to be spent on the reading, but I find Camus an author I can sink into fairly easily. Camus will probably be reserved for reading by the fire at the ski lodge or perhaps somewhere equally comforting like a coffee shop where I can let his words and the accompanied warmth from the fire and the drinks wash over me.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

This is the novel my mum passed on to me when I arrived in Cairns as she and my sister both read it on their recent trip to Adelaide. Neither of them enjoyed it but not wanting to waste a perfectly good book she suggested I give it a go, and if I don't like it at least take it with me so I can swap it at one of our hostel's book swaps! This is the book I'm reading in Cairns so I may have finished it before I head to Japan (especially since I'm avoiding leaving the house because the outside world = money spent) but if I have any of it left I'll be trying to read it on the plane. As an action thriller it has the perfect mixture of a fast paced plot combined with a relative easy plot structure so it should help the long plane flight drag a little less.

And if all else fails I have just started Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban on my Ipod and I have the rest of the series sitting there waiting for me. Good old HP, he never lets you down!!

A blog from the airport

Hello friends! I've made it home to sunny Cairns and I've already got sunburn!! I was not made for living in the tropics, no wonder I'm heading to wintery Japan for the summer!! Here is an entry I wrote last night as I waited and waited at the airport for my late flight to Cairns, it is a little all over the place but that tends to be the way my mind works!!

As I write this I sit in the Brisbane Airport waiting for my flight to Cairns, and a long wait it'll be since my flight doesn't board for another hour. To kill time I headed into the airport bookstore, a favourite airport past-time of mine.

At uni I encountered students and teachers alike who poo-poo'd what they call 'airport fiction,' and while I agree to an extent, the terrible works of one Matthew Reilley which line airport bookstore shelves comes to mind, I tend to take offence to that label. I have bought several great books from the airport and while they may be over-priced (oh god are they over-priced!) they certainly aren't trash.

Perhaps once upon a time it was all romance and action  sold in these bookstores but that certainly isn't the case anymore- at least not in Australian airports. During my trip into this bookstore I came across the works of Franzen, Bronte, Courteney and Palahniuk. Maybe some of these authors are easier to read that others but all are well respected and attributed with being top level word-smiths. 

This is just another case of the snobbery I've come across in the literary world. Just because a book can be read in one sitting or is sold in an airport bookstore doesn't mean it is of a lesser quality than those sold at independent bookstores. I mean, yes of course these airport bookstores are out to make a profit and for the most part Dostoyevsky isn't top of the list on everyone's reading while flying list, but just because genre fiction is what fills the majority of the shelves doesn't make it of a lesser quality.

As was repeated to me over and over in my classes at uni Literary fiction appeals to perhaps 6% (rough estimate) of book sales- while my classmates took that to mean that they were smarter that 94% of book buyers I took it for what it truly meant, that the literary aspirations of Literary authors is not appealing to a great number of people (regardless of what their IQ is). Generally books that fall into the Literary category make great use of form and technique over plot and even character, they are about manipulating and shaping words to create meaning. One teacher explained it best as genre fiction is designed to drag you into the story and take you deep into it, while literary fiction is about displaying the beauty of words and writing techniques, the former is about emotion and the latter about provoking thought.

Because Literary stories are so aware of their creation they can be hard to read fluidly, regardless of how beautifully stitched together the prose is. This isn't to have a go at Literary fiction, I adore many Literary works and I will also admit to feeling a little smug when I finish a Russian novel and understand it, I am simply sick of people having a go at anything that doesn't fall into this category, of relegating it to a lower caste simply because it doesn't make excessive use of experimental narrative structure or writing techniques.

Of course what I've written has been a bit of a generalisation, there are many Literary novels which dwell on character and plot and several genre works which are highly experimental in their writing methods. It doesn't really matter though, writing is supposed to incite thought and emotion, to drag you into other worlds and teach you meaningful lessons. Books are not here to make you feel superior or to wear as a badge of success as you read on public transport. It doesn't matter if you're reading Austen, Dickens or Homer it does not make you better than the people who choose to read science fiction or romance (well....JK). By all means bond with someone on public transport because of what they are reading but don't use it as a measure of a person's character.

This is one of my biggest literary pet peeves so I'm glad I had some time at the airport to vent out my frustrations to you all!! Bottom line I guess is don't judge a book by it's genre!

Top Ten Tuesday... Santa please bring me...

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created here at The Broke and the Bookish. This meme was created because we are particularly fond of lists here at The Broke and the Bookish. We'd love to share our lists with other bookish folks and would LOVE to see your top ten lists!

The Bloodclot that is Andrew Bolt

In regards to the rant post I wrote earlier today I urge you to read this artice by acclaimed author John Birmingham. It addresses some of the issues I raised earlier and condemns the 'journalist' Andrew Bolt who spreads his venomous hate across the country weekly in his pathetic excuse for a column.JB's article is far more articulate than what I could ever hope to write on here and a damn good example of the pen being mightier than the sword.