I first tried to read this book in 2010 right away when I got it. I just couldn't get much into it, but that summer I also had zero non-dissertation related reading time, so that probably contributed to not getting through a 644 page book.

My husband wants to see the American movie, and I'm a person who prefers to read the book a movie is based on before seeing the movie, if possible. The eminent release of said movie bumped this book back up to the top of Mt. TBR. I read it over few days in December 2011. Amazing what having a few hours to read (and staying up too late with the luxury of just reading) will do.

I'm not a crime fiction reader. I like crime fiction with actual science in it because I'm a scientist and I often know just enough about most of the crime science techniques as spin-offs from my chemistry education. There is nothing like that in this book. In fact, other than the vague amazing-ness of the computer hacking, I knew most of the computer stuff the people used well enough to make it mundane. Sorry, if it has to be couched in impossible-ness in order to make it amazing, then you lose me.

Lisbeth Salander is definitely badass, but in a broken version of Sarah Conner (T2) sort of way. The only twist is that she actually does save the guy at the end. I was surprised because I was certain that it would follow the trope that no matter how badass she is, she'd be the one to end up in the clutches of the bad guy and have to be saved by the hero of the novel. In fact, the hero of the novel has to be saved by her. This is cool. This is fairly redeeming. However, I really felt like this was a novel written by a guy for his peers - peers being narrowly defined as other men like him.

Also, the plot was bland. The other reason I don't like crime fiction is unless they throw in something completely unrelated and presented, I always figure out whodunit early enough to make me impatient with the stupidity of the characters and the plot rather than enjoy it. This book was no different.

What I found more interesting about this novel was the politics. There was definitely a commentary on both corporate greed and too much power of the state. Sadly, in order to be sure I was writing this correctly, I re-read the bio of the author and realized I misread it the first time. One aspect of this novel I found intriguing has just been shown to not be how I thought. I'm now disappointed and the novel has lost the last thing that made it interesting to me.

To be honest, unless someone who felt this novel was only okay to begin with tells me these novels get better, I'm not in any hurry to read the rest of the books in the series. I'll probably just see the movies with my husband and call it good.