The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson is the first of three installments in the self-titled series, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Because it is a murder mystery novel revolving around Sweden’s top magazine editors and their companies, I thought it would be a great book. The book starts out slow, taking a few chapters to go into detail on the court case that starts it all. You’d think that as soon as everything has been drastically described and thoroughly explained, there would finally be something new. Well, you’re wrong. This book has one of the slowest plots I’ve ever seen in a book. Not only that, I couldn’t even get through 100 pages.

“Well it couldn’t have been that boring, you’re just exaggerating” is probably what you’re thinking. I’m actually crying; I expected so much from this book. From the title alone I got some ‘this book is about a ninja assassin girl with a dragon tattoo’ vibes but instead I got ‘this book is about nosy cubicle workers and their inappropriate relationships with their bosses’. The beginning of the book is basically a 20-page breakdown of Sweden’s political situation and their current stocks. Cue the snores! I got so impatient I decided to skip ahead all the way to page 25, and hoped I’d finally get some action.

I stuck to scanning the pages instead of taking the time to read the book simply so that I could skip all of the boring business-talk. You know when there’s a dialogue scene in a movie, with no action except characters talking to each other? That’s what this book was like for me. I toughed it out until I got to page 68, and then I couldn’t keep going. I do not recommend this book for those of you who don’t understand Swedish economics. The book is a whopping 590 pages! I spent all of September trying to get into the book, but came up short. If you do choose to read this book and happen to understand what’s actually happening here, I beg you, please explain it to me.