Shelf Indulgence

So, the series draws to a close with this novel, and true to form, Larsson took the same cast of characters (plus a few extra) and made a different sort of novel using them all. This time, he wrote a pretty good police procedural thriller that, to me, was far more interesting than any of the other books in that genre I've read. Granted, I haven't read that many of them, but still, I wasn't left wanting for more with this book. Other than the occasional episode of "Law and Order," I find police procedurals to be pretty dull.

This novel was probably the most difficult to finish, because (a) police procedurals are usually full of details, and (b) I've already covered how Larsson covers every teeny-tiny little detail of his novels in microscopic, clinical detail. Combine the two characteristics and you get a near-tedious presentation of everything that happens in the book. The book started out well -- it literally started right where the second book left off -- and then hit the doldrums for a few hundred pages before it picked up near the end, as the trial began. Interestingly, the trial itself doesn't take that long, but the detail is just right at that point. The author shifted from narrative to dialogue for much of that portion of the novel, and it increased the pace and readability of that part of the story. By then, it was smooth sailing through the end of the book.

I wish that Larsson had lived long enough to pursue this series. I understand that he had up to ten books planned out before his death, and given that he was writing distinctly different books with each novel, I would be curious to see where he would take his characters next. Surely a science fiction or fantasy setting wasn't too far off, right? Because that's what we would all really like to see: Salander in space.