Recently read: The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

After a certain furor of recommendation from friends and acquaintances, I tried the first of Stieg Larsson's Lisbeth Salandar books, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. It's billed more as a crime thriller than a mystery or a procedural, and I'd have to say that's accurate. Strictly as a mystery, it's not so great. The presentation of the protagonists' investigations is reasonably pleasing, but in many places a bit too pat (and thus, a bit of a wash as a procedural).

The book got recommended to me on two counts: that the characterization was rich and complex, and that the novel struggled with modern social issues. I take a bit of challenge with those assessments, both.

First, while the drawing of the main characters is not completely flat, but the motivations of most of the minor characters are relatively flat and boring. Rather than draw too much depth into the supporting cast, Larsson solves the flatness problem by doubling or trebling the cast of minor characters so that the reader gets a lot of facets to look at, even though they present themselves in different people.

Second, much seems to be made of the author's expertise on Sweden's history of right-wing and fascist political splinter groups (in the blurbs for the book). Yet not much hay is made of this particular problem in the narrative. Rather, the plot weaves around "men who hate women" and, in my opinion, doesn't really treat that problem with much depth or even-handedness. Men in the book seem to come in three sorts: socially sensitive sorts (protagonists) whose behaviour is "good", confused but not aggressive types whose behaviour is generally neutral or at least susceptible to proper education, and the irredeemable rapist who all seem to slide to the far edge of depravity and criminality hand-in-hand with their inability to see women as anything other than chattel (and loathsome chattel at that).

Worse yet, the subtext of the book privileges criminality when "done for the right reason". The protagonists of the book engage in theft, murder-by-proxy, assault, breaking-and-entering, invasion of privacy, and a whole host of dirty tricks, in order to further their causes. All of this is presented positively and lauded, for two reasons: firstly, the establishment is corrupt, hence the rule of law cannot be trusted, hence the righteous man (or woman) must act independently for justice; secondly, any means used to defend one's own person and property is reasonably justifiable, provided the one doesn't use force in excess of the threat (i.e. an eye for an eye, in the face of a corrupt state, is perfectly sensible, and in fact heroic).

So, while the book seems to laud leftist and feminist principles, it actually (as far as I can see) uses it as window dressing to push a libertarian and violent agenda. The rule of law cannot be depended upon (because it is stacked with horribly oppressive members of the patriarchy who abuse their power in order to, essentially, rape women), ergo, bloody retribution is justified and laudable.

It's awfully hard to tell whether Larsson is consciously promoting his subtext, or whether he is attempting to provoke the reader into thinking about the subtext's implications. With Milton, I suspect that one can be fairly certain that it would be a stretch for him to be promoting Satan as, really, "the good guy". With Larsson's drawing of Salander and her happy enabler/lover Blomqvist, it's hard to see whether he wants you to cheer Salander's criminal and anti-social behaviour, or sympathize with it as unavoidable because of her tormented past, or really think hard about agency, criminality, and social responsibility. Salander is, in her own way, every bit as much a monster as the men she dismantles.

And of course, like Thomas Harris discovered, the fans really like them some psychotic geniuses! Salander is a bit of a feminist, gen-y, Hannibal Lecter, and I'm reasonably curious to see whether Larsson sees that, and how he deals with her in the two follow-on books.

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is a lengthy (probably overly lengthy) crime thriller that may be better written than most other modern exemplars of the genre; however, it pales in comparison to the best of the Swedish procedurals (Mankell, Sjöwall & Wahlöö) that have better plots, better characters, and better portrayals of Swedish society and its ills. If you've read Harris and you liked Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs, then this book might be up your alley: Larsson is, after all, a compelling writer and the translation is good. I'd rate this a solid B.

Recently read: The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

After a certain furor of recommendation from friends and acquaintances, I tried the first of Stieg Larsson's Lisbeth Salandar books, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. It's billed more as a crime thriller than a mystery or a procedural, and I'd have to say that's accurate. Strictly as a mystery, it's not so great. The presentation of the protagonists' investigations is reasonably pleasing, but in many places a bit too pat (and thus, a bit of a wash as a procedural).

The book got recommended to me on two counts: that the characterization was rich and complex, and that the novel struggled with modern social issues. I take a bit of challenge with those assessments, both.

First, while the drawing of the main characters is not completely flat, but the motivations of most of the minor characters are relatively flat and boring. Rather than draw too much depth into the supporting cast, Larsson solves the flatness problem by doubling or trebling the cast of minor characters so that the reader gets a lot of facets to look at, even though they present themselves in different people.

Second, much seems to be made of the author's expertise on Sweden's history of right-wing and fascist political splinter groups (in the blurbs for the book). Yet not much hay is made of this particular problem in the narrative. Rather, the plot weaves around "men who hate women" and, in my opinion, doesn't really treat that problem with much depth or even-handedness. Men in the book seem to come in three sorts: socially sensitive sorts (protagonists) whose behaviour is "good", confused but not aggressive types whose behaviour is generally neutral or at least susceptible to proper education, and the irredeemable rapist who all seem to slide to the far edge of depravity and criminality hand-in-hand with their inability to see women as anything other than chattel (and loathsome chattel at that).

Worse yet, the subtext of the book privileges criminality when "done for the right reason". The protagonists of the book engage in theft, murder-by-proxy, assault, breaking-and-entering, invasion of privacy, and a whole host of dirty tricks, in order to further their causes. All of this is presented positively and lauded, for two reasons: firstly, the establishment is corrupt, hence the rule of law cannot be trusted, hence the righteous man (or woman) must act independently for justice; secondly, any means used to defend one's own person and property is reasonably justifiable, provided the one doesn't use force in excess of the threat (i.e. an eye for an eye, in the face of a corrupt state, is perfectly sensible, and in fact heroic).

So, while the book seems to laud leftist and feminist principles, it actually (as far as I can see) uses it as window dressing to push a libertarian and violent agenda. The rule of law cannot be depended upon (because it is stacked with horribly oppressive members of the patriarchy who abuse their power in order to, essentially, rape women), ergo, bloody retribution is justified and laudable.

It's awfully hard to tell whether Larsson is consciously promoting his subtext, or whether he is attempting to provoke the reader into thinking about the subtext's implications. With Milton, I suspect that one can be fairly certain that it would be a stretch for him to be promoting Satan as, really, "the good guy". With Larsson's drawing of Salander and her happy enabler/lover Blomqvist, it's hard to see whether he wants you to cheer Salander's criminal and anti-social behaviour, or sympathize with it as unavoidable because of her tormented past, or really think hard about agency, criminality, and social responsibility. Salander is, in her own way, every bit as much a monster as the men she dismantles.

And of course, like Thomas Harris discovered, the fans really like them some psychotic geniuses! Salander is a bit of a feminist, gen-y, Hannibal Lecter, and I'm reasonably curious to see whether Larsson sees that, and how he deals with her in the two follow-on books.

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is a lengthy (probably overly lengthy) crime thriller that may be better written than most other modern exemplars of the genre; however, it pales in comparison to the best of the Swedish procedurals (Mankell, Sjöwall & Wahlöö) that have better plots, better characters, and better portrayals of Swedish society and its ills. If you've read Harris and you liked Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs, then this book might be up your alley: Larsson is, after all, a compelling writer and the translation is good. I'd rate this a solid B.