food&drink | book club dinner
The Book
Looking for a great summer read? The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is the thrilling first book of the Millennium trilogy written by the late Swedish author, Stieg Larsson. The story, set mainly on a secluded Swedish island, begins with the disappearance forty years ago of Harriet, a member of the powerful Vanger family who own the island. Harriet was sixteen at the time of her disappearance. We pick up the story with her aging great-uncle Henrik, who believes Harriet was murdered by one of her own family members. Central to the story is Mikael Blomkvist, the forty-something divorced journalist and publisher of Millennium magazine, whose career has just crashed and burned. When we meet Blomkvist, he has just been found guilty of libel and defamation of powerful Swedish industrialist, Hans- Erik Wennerstrom. With a few months to go before having to serve his sentence,Book Club
Dinner
with Christine & Sue
Sue Hudson and Christine Scheer have chosen a Summer Reading Page-Turner for this issue's Book Club Dinner
selection! Enjoy Stieg Larsson's
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,
published by Viking Canada, paired with a delicious summer menu.
Blomkvist, to his surprise, is approached by Henrik Vanger to investigate the decades-old disappearance of Harriet. In return for Blomkvist's help, Vanger offers him lucrative compensation; but more importantly, Vanger offers Blomkvist information he could use against Wennerstrom to eventually clear his name. Enter Lisbeth Salander, (aka, "the girl with the dragon tattoo"). Lisbeth is a cryptic, tough, 24-year-old genius computer-hacker (with a past), who has been hired to "cyber-spy" on Blomkvist. After hacking into his files, she is convinced of his innocence and decides to contact him, kicking off the start of the trilogy's central relationship between these two unlikely characters. The suspense of the novel builds as Blomkvist and Lisbeth, now working together, investigate Harriet's disappearance, soon putting themselves on the path of a monstrous serial killer. As the pair find themselves in increasing danger, Lisbeth's vast intellect and "superheroine" survival skills begin to reveal themselves. Readers are given clues into her troubled past, fleshing out her unique and complex character. The second book in the trilogy, The Girl who Played with Fire, was released in 2009, and the much-anticipated final installment, The Girl who Kicked the Dragon's Nest, was released in May of this year. All three have become international bestsellers. And if you like movies, an excellent Swedish version (with English subtitles) of the first book came out earlier this year. Christine and I, having both loved the book, went to see it. We were fascinated by this thrilling and Food photography by Andrea Senyk atmospheric film made by Swedish director Niels Arden Oplev. The movie was edge-of-your-seat suspenseful (and just as a warning, deserved its "R" rating, due to the violence). The director is presently in the works with the next two movies. Sadly, the books' author never knew of the world-wide popularity of his work. Stieg Larsson died suddenly in 2004 at the age of fifty, after suffering a heart attack; he had just delivered the manuscripts for the three books to his Swedish publisher. Larsson was a journalist and magazine publisher (much like his character, Mikael Blomkvist), and had been writing the novels in his free time. At present, the books have been published in 21 different countries and have sold more than 20 million copies. In 2008, four years after his death, he had become the second bestselling author in the world. For more information on Stieg Larsson and the trilogy, visit www.stieglarsson.com. The Millennium Trilogy by Stieg Larsson The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Viking Canada 2008, hardcover) (Penguin Canada 2009, paperback) The Girl who Played with Fire (Viking Canada 2009, hardcover) (Penguin Canada 2010, paperback) The Girl who Kicked the Dragon's Nest (Viking Canada 2010, hardcover) sue hudson is a London teacher-librarian and can be reached with questions or comments at: sue.hudson1@gmail.com. 30 | CITYWOMAN ISSUE ELEVEN: JULY/AUGUST 2010 www.citywoman.ca
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