A review by laurenleigh
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

dark tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

For the most part, I was very engaged with this book. I enjoyed the cold case mystery  element and the locked-room/whodunnit style. But then there were all these other elements to the text I didn’t love. The last two hours of this audiobook, after they wrapped up the mystery plot, felt completely unnecessary and even boring. And then there’s Lisbeth Salander. I can’t decide how I feel about Larsson’s writing here. On one hand, he seemed to want to shed light on violence and discrimination against women, especially in Sweden. And a good well-rounded character should keep me guessing. But there were some aspects of her character and her actions that rang untrue or even a bit sexist. And was all the graphic sexual violence really necessary? It felt gratuitous at times and was honestly pretty distressing. I knew this text was dark, but yikes, major content warnings abound.
Expand filter menu Content Warnings