Review of 'The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest'

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest by Stieg Larsson
3rd book in the 'Millennium' series

This final chapter in the Millenium series picks up where The Girl Who Played With Fire left off (stop reading now if you haven't read it yet!) with Lisbeth Salander being taken to the hospital suffering from mortal wounds (including a gunshot to the head) along with her estranged father suffering from a seemingly terminal axe in the head (courtesy of Lisbeth). It is not far to stretch to see that both of them survive with Lisbeth facing various criminal charges. Mikael Blomkvist, the Millenium reporter, starts looking into exactly what is going on and uncovers a conspiracy in the Swedish Secret Police (Sapo) that goes all the way to the top - The prime minister. How will he go about proving the innocence of Salander and reveal the truth of the whole story? Who will believe him when he says that there has been a tragic miscarriage of justice by the government when it comes to the handling of one Lisbeth Salander? What has this all got to do with a Russian defector? The answers are revealed.

Right, very complicated. If you thought there were a lot of characters and narrative threads in the first two books, you haven't seen anything yet. Another doorstop of a book with unpronounceable names and places. I got lost on more than one occasion but that is actually fine as Larsson has a way of keeping you in the story even if you are not 100% following it. He is at the top of his game here and the story is very adequately tied up by the end. It starts a bit slow but it leads up to the ever looming and inevitable climax. As a matter of fact I was getting a bit concerned as the pages went by as to when the climax would eventually arrive. Different from The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, this book concentrates more on the research and built-up to the climax as opposed to the climax and ramifications thereof…Which is fine by me.

A must read for fans of the series. I can't say it is 5 out of 5 as it is still sometimes needlessly complex and drags in parts but on the whole this book is very interesting and enjoyable (?).

Rating: “Really good but I have some issues”

Review Date: 2012-07-11

Genre: Crime/Mystery

Publisher: Quercus

Publication Date: 2007

• The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Book 1)
• The Girl Who Played with Fire (Book 2)

• The Girl Who Played with Fire (Book 2 of Millennium)
• The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Book 1 of Millennium)