FIRST GREAT READS FOR JANUARY, 2018
The Girl Who Takes an Eye for an Eye, by David Lagercrantz
This episode of Lisbeth’s story starts with a two-month
prison sentence: despite her heroic
rescue of a little boy whose life was under threat, she is imprisoned for a
minor infringement connected to his case, a classic example of being damned for
doing something, or damned for doing nothing.
In true Salander fashion, she hunkers down to silently serve the time –
until the terrible plight of a young Bangla Deshi prisoner being abused and
bullied by the terrifying prison Top Dog offends her sense of fairness: in due course the Top Dog is sent to hospital
with shocking facial injuries – and Lisbeth’s sentence ends early for ‘good
behaviour’.
She is free again, free to investigate more aspects of
her horrendous childhood in orphanages and psychiatric hospitals and, with the
usual expert help from Millenium Magazine editor extraordinaire Mikael
Lindkvist, try to expose the perpetrators behind early psychological
experiments on twins that all went shockingly, fatally wrong. For Salander has a twin, Camilla – as evil as
she is good, and they were both subjected to the same psychiatric ‘evaluations’. Thanks to her guile and beauty, Camilla
escaped and fled to Russia and a life of crime with their gangster father. Now Salander feels that it is time to find
out how many other cases of ‘separated’ twins are out there, and who authorised
it – and most importantly: why are
people starting to die so that these ‘experiments’ may remain secret?
As with the previous book, there is plenty of
action; Lisbeth is still a champion
karate expert, not to mention the Queen of Hackers and a superior mathematician
( is there nothing this girl cannot do?
Yep! She can’t cook – not that
she cares – she adores junk food.) but this story has a couple of subplots that
require a lot of characters; it is as
though Mr Lagercrantz had several causes he wanted to promote and tried to fit
them all into one story. That is a
shame, for the plot slows, moving along by fits and starts: the ghost of Stieg Larsson must be tsk-tsking
and wagging his finger.
Nevertheless, Mr Lagercrantz’s mastery of the complex
character that is Lisbeth Salander is absolute;
he’s still a worthy successor to Stieg Larsson and if there are a few
less subplots in the next novel that’s all to the good. FOUR STARS
The
Girl in the Spider’s Web, by David Lagercrantz,
Continuing
Stieg Larsson’s Millenium series.
Swedish
author David Lagercrantz has been given the daunting task of continuing Stieg
Larsson’s blockbuster series of novels about Lisbeth Salander, ace computer
hacker, mathematical genius and all-round general recluse and misfit, and
Mikael Blomkvist, crusading investigative journalist, founder with his
some-time lover Erika Berger of the high-end Millennium Magazine, their weapon
against graft and corruption in high places.
They have many enemies; those who
don’t want their dirty secrets exposed, and colleagues from other publications
who envy their stellar reputation.
Millennium is constantly under siege from those whose causes would be
furthered if it became defunct, and when this story opens, Blomkvist and Berger
are facing a takeover that has definitely turned hostile.
Mr Lagerkrantz has done a formidable job of filling in
the backstory from Stieg Larsson’s three wonderful books; he is meticulous in the origins of Salander’s
and Blomkvist’s relationship and has fashioned a credible, clever plot that
every reader will find compelling, especially as Lisbeth’s long lost sister
Camilla – as beautiful as Lisbeth is not – makes an appearance to equal that of
her half-brother Ronald Niedermann, a monster impervious to pain. It is very clear that the siblings’ awful
father, Alexander Zalachenko has bequeathed some horrific genes to his
unfortunate progeny, but Lisbeth is the only one with a conscience and a sense
of what is right – which makes her a formidable opponent of her sister, whose
hatred of Lisbeth is as deep as it is irrational.
The reader has to concentrate; Mr Lagerkrantz’s plot is not simple. Professor Frans Balder, a technological
genius and front-runner in the race to produce superior artificial intelligence
is murdered by intruders but all they take are his computer and cell
phone. Unfortunately for the assailant,
Balder’s 8 year-old son, August, witnesses the murder. He is severely handicapped by autism – but he
draws beautifully and it is absurdly easy for him to produce with photographic
realism his impression of the death scene and the killer. Which means that he has to die, too.
Enter Lisbeth Salander:
she literally comes to the rescue of August with a flying rugby tackle
and the hijacking of an innocent motorist (who will never be the same again!) –
she knew Professor Balder and has uncovered from her various hacking exercises
(the National Security Agency has received special attention) that his worries
about keeping his studies and conclusions secret were anything but
unfounded. She takes it upon herself
(with the help of Blomkvist and Berger) to go into hiding with August, whose
traumatic experiences Lisbeth identifies with completely. She is a formidable
protector and once again the reader is swept up and borne inexorably on the
waves of suspense to the end of a great story.
Mr Lagerkrantz is a highly
efficient and meticulous writer; he has
covered every base, recreated Mr Larsson’s characters superbly and generated
enough suspense for more than one novel – which I hope means that another won’t
be far off for the beautiful, evil Camilla is still at large, and the NSA is
still highly suspect despite being on the side of right. This is a very
competent sequel and I look forward to reading the next one. FIVE STARS
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