I’d heard of this book via some other book blogs, and was tantalized by its ability to generate such a passionate following among its readers. In spite of knowing almost nothing about the story, I went ahead and downloaded it to my nook®. About the same time, a fellow-reader in my office went to see the movie (Swedish, with sub-titles). I was about a hundred pages into the book and she – and another co-worker who read the book, but didn’t go see the movie – had kept ‘checking on me’ to see what I thought of it. Up until that point, nothing too shocking had happened. But then… things got interesting. Graphically, violently and disturbingly interesting. I then understood what my co-workers were waiting for me to get to…
However, looking past the violence, I found this book to be quite the page-turner and the character of Lisbeth Salander one of the most intriguing I’ve encountered in my 2010 reading. Just as the USA Today review says (linked below), I begin to care and worry about ‘poor little’ Lisbeth as if she were real. (I think this is similar to the attraction Mikael Blomkvist has in the novel). I was rooting for her. When she settled scores – for herself and others – I was right there with her virtually cheering her on.
It just so happens that the one theater in town that is showing this movie is about a mile from my workplace, so I also popped over after work last Wednesday to watch it. Although it captured the overall feeling of the story, it did so while leaving out a lot of the details. Somehow it worked anyway, probably due in a large part to Noomi Rapace’s performance in the title role.
Noomi Rapace as “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo”
This may be the shortest interval I’ve ever had between finishing a book and seeing a movie version. With it fresh in my mind (& knowing the story going in) I didn’t even mind the subtitles.
Thumbs up to both the written and film versions. I have already downloaded the 2nd book in the “Millenium Trilogy” (The Girl Who Played with Fire) and am about 1/3 of the way through with it already. Stay tuned.
I found an interesting short review on the second book of the series here. I believe it does a good job of describing the appeal of the Salander character, although I object to the writer’s labelling of Salander as a ‘computer nerd.’ She is so much more.
