The Girl Who Kicked the Book Right Back to the Library

I was so excited to find Stieg Larsson’s third Lisbeth Salander novel, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, sitting on the library shelf. It was a 14-day book, but that reduced borrowing period had never been an issue with me. I could read three or four books in two weeks, even if I opened them only at mealtimes.

It has now been 13 days. I’m on page 281—of 563. I’m not going to finish this book, at least not now.

Note to authors: Please don’t give your characters similar names. Was Niedermann or Nieminen suspected of murder? Who was investigating? Was it Ekstrom, Eriksson, Edklinth, or all three? And what were the roles of Bjurman, Berger, Blomkvist, and Bublanski again? It’s enough to make a reader crazy.

Did I mention that this novel is set in Sweden? The translator did a fantastic job, but he couldn’t change the street names, for instance when “Figuerola drove her white Saab 9-5 to Vittangigatan in Vallingby” or reached the Bishop’s Arms and “found a parking space on Bellmansgatan at the corner with Tavastagatan.”

I slogged through the first 150 pages of The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest just to digest the background, which I didn’t remember from reading the second installment. It had been too long between books, and this one contained WTMI: way too much information.

Note to authors: Let us know what we have to remember, or just leave out the irrelevant parts.

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest is going back to the library today. I could try to renew it, but I won’t. It bugs me to have read the first two books in this best-selling series and then to let this one go at the halfway point, but for Pete’s sake, I’d rather do math problems.