The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - Review

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson was overall an enjoyable novel. Filled with twists and turns it sucks you and grabs of hold of your imagination taking you along on the mysterious journey of main character Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist. Lisbeth is a psychotic, keep-to-yourself computer genius. Left an orphan at the age of ten she is guarded and terribly misunderstood. Her short chopped hair and collection of piercings and tattoos, alongside her alternative lifestyle only helps but add more mystery to Lisbeth’s character.  Opposite her is male lead Blomkvist, a journalist who recently, after getting mixed up in a false allegations scandal was forced to resign from his company and lay low for a while. A father, divorced, and involved with his long time co-worker Berger, Mikael is a respectable and personable man. His character has much less mystery and suspense and that of Salander, but still it manages to create a balance in the piece in which both characters are able to exists in harmony in the book without seeming to forced. The characters are perfect for the roles to which they are assigned. Both weaving seamlessly into one another and it, without doubt, works.

The two meet when they are both assigned to work a case for a wealthy elderly man named Vanger who has asked them to solve the disappearance of his granddaughter Harriet who had done missing nearly fifty years earlier.  Salander, being the highly skilled hacker she is was perfect for the job, able to spy, research and pry into the lives of the Vanger family and their company in order to extract any information that may pertain to the case. Blomkvist on the other hand, is a journalist whose job is, yes, to dig up information and report about it he seemed to be far from murder investigator. Originally intending to turn down Vanger on his offer to research Harriet’s disappearance he is swayed by and offer he cannot refuse. Now while it all seems a little hokey it actually makes for a pretty good starting point. Two characters, both with different motives, backgrounds and personally agendas driven to the case that takes readers on a fast paced investigation that keeps you flipping pages to see what happens next.
           The novel’s primary plot is not so much unique as it just well told. There are hundreds of novels out there with a similar premise as that of Larsson’s however this book is told in a unique way. It has unique characters, and tiny little details that at first seem meaningless but all later blend together to create a full color 3-D picture that makes the book such a thrilling, and fulfilling novel. The style of writing in Larsson’s book is consistent and sharp. Precise sentence structure and voice only adds to the intellectual, mysterious themes of the book. Larsson’s choice of diction and delicate word play give it a clever, eerie tone. Long detailed descriptions paired with short, powerful dialogue, provides the proper right amount of information while not breaking away from his strict characterization of his characters.