Page Turners

I am reading the trilogy of books by Stieg Larsson.   I can't remember the last time I have been so completely engrossed in a novel, on the edge of my chair, unable to put it down.  When I read the first book, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, it was not immediately obvious to me that the girl Salander was the main character.  The plot was so complex and featured the character Blomvist, an investigative journalist.  There was a complicated murder mystery to be solved there, and Salander seemed to be just extraneous to the plot. I did not know until the end of the book,  that it was Salander whose story is key.

It was immediately obvious at the beginning of the second book,  The Girl Who Played With Fire, that Lisbeth Salander is the main character, and what a fascinating and unique heroine she is.   By the time I am getting toward the last quarter of that book,  I didn't really want it to be over.  I can see as I read more pages, that everything is not going to be resolved when I finish the second book.  It is driving me crazy!  I do not have the next in the series.   I look into the library possibility, and there is a long waiting list.  I look at the stores, and discover that the paperback has not yet been released. It is only available in hardcover.  Amazon has used copies, but with shipping it would cost as much as the hard copy.     I can't stand to finish the second book and not have the next one immediately accessible.  When I got within just a few pages of the ending,  I went to the store and bought the hard copy of the last in the series,  The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest.


I still do not know everything I need to know about our heroine.  And the ending really left the reader hanging.  I haven't started the third book yet,  but I will in a day or two.  They are all long books, and I feel like I haven't really been doing anything else.  Not that it matters.  I have been totally enthralled!  Can't remember when it was so much fun to curl up in a chair with a good book, being completely entertained!

What a tragedy that this author died too soon.   As a writer myself, I am enormously curious about how this story "got written".   It unfolds slowly over three books.  Did the author know the ending of the third book when  he started the first?.  Or did he simply write the first book and fall so much in love with Salander that he could not get enough of her?  That's my best guess.

But of course, that is a question that will never be answered.