The Girl Who Played With Fire -- Take 2

It took me way longer to finish this book than it should have (as with most books). But in fairness, I wasn't actually reading it most of the time. I tore through the first half at the tail end of the Thanksgiving holiday, mostly on the plane on the way home. Then I stumbled through about 30 pages off and on, in between doing other things. Then the Christmas craziness started, and I've been toting it around without reading a single page for about a month.

Finally - FINALLY! - I finished it! I had one of those great nights where you lose yourself in a book for four hours, all other necessities and obligations be damned. I didn't even get up to go to the bathroom. Although I did stop for ice cream. (Remember that thing I said about eating ice cream three times a day?) My life tends to border on hectic, and I don't often run across days where I have a free block of time and nothing particularly pressing to do. Let me tell you, it is fantastic when it happens. I can do things like read books!

I guess I should get to the book itself. Slightly better written than the first one, I thought. But definitely not enduring-for-centuries type literature. In fact, I'm struggling a little bit about why these books are classed as "Fiction/Literature" in bookstores, rather than in the genre fiction category of "Mystery." The best I can come up with is that they're immensely popular, and genre fiction is often considered second-class stuff. Actually, I listened to an episode of To the Best of Our Knowledge a while back on the topic of genre fiction, if anyone's interested.

I digress. Not great writing. But immensely engrossing. One of those great, suspenseful stories that you can lose yourself in, if you find the time. On the whole, quite enjoyable. I will definitely read the final (?) installment.

And as a little added boost, I just picked up the DVD of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo from the library, so I'll be watching that soon!