I confess to having read this several years back. On second read it was easier to follow the very involved plots that follow several characters from different angles. The 'Dragon Tattoo' series started the craze for Nordic mysteries written in a rather dark style. Larsson has created a very unusual heroin in Salander, a tough chic, regarded as somewhat slow because of her extreme introversion, who is an expert computer hacker. She is just 5 foot tall, tends to dress in Goth style, and quite able to fend for herself. She makes a living as a contract investigator for a security firm. The story involves solving two sets of mysteries at once - the first, the disappearance and possible murder of an heiress to an industrial empire who disappeared forty years ago. The second is a more mundane uncovering of crime and misdeeds by a respected financier. Both stories revolve around Mikael Blomkvist, a journalist and founding co-editor of a leading financial journal, who has been convicted of libel related to the second mystery. Salander is called on to assist Blomkvist with the investigation of the disappearance, and is integral to uncovering key facts about the long-dead case. She then also puts her skills as a hacker to work on the investigation of the financier. A fare share of violence and sexual abuse; definitely NOT a cozy mystery. Well-written, if a bit slow paced at times. 644 pages, paperback.
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