Review | Stieg Larsson’s legacy honoured in the tattooed girl’s latest outing
The Girl Who Takes an Eye for an Eye: David Lagercrantz honours his fellow Swede’s legacy with gripping, if unwieldy novel that should keep Larsson fans happy
The Girl Who Takes an Eye for an Eye
by David Lagercrantz
Knopf
When the history of early 21st-century literature is laid down, Stieg Larsson’s Millennium trilogy deserves a mention, if only for its formidable sales, which made the books a genuine literary phenomenon.
Their success owed much to the Swedish writer’s captivating backstory: Larsson’s books were written in secret and only published after his tragically early death, aged 50, in 2004. Public obsession with his dark thrillers was also fuelled by his duelling heroes, Mikael Blomkvist and Lisbeth Salander.
The more cliched aspects of Blomkvist (he is not contemporary crime’s first flawed, middle-aged detective who nevertheless seems irresistible to women) were enlivened by his crusading day job in investigative journalism.
Salander, by contrast, truly earned the trilogy’s many headlines and film adaptations. A cyber-punk genius who might look more at home in a Prodigy video, she was vulnerable and tough, down-to-earth and utterly enigmatic.
Each of the original books’ titles includes the word “girl”: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest. When Larsson’s publisher decided to expand the trilogy by employing bestselling author David Lagercrantz, also a Swede, “girl” remained central to the mystique of the brand.