About the Millenium trilogy
The thing that bothers me about Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is that it's such obvious self-insert, and yet no one seems to notice it. I mean, Stieg Larsson was a liberal political writer working for a magazine that wrote exposes on people. So what is Blomkvist? A liberal political writer working for a magazine that wrote exposes on people, that just happens to be handsome, wealthy, irresistible for the ladies and fantastical in bed acording to his boss that just can't keep herself from sleeping with him even when she shouldn't.
And then he sort of created the mary-sue to go with his avatar, a girl that seems refreshingly different on the surface to the usual political thriller novel, but becomes more and more cliched as the books go by and you find out how she's so trendy she only shops in the mac store and ikea*, rides a motorbike because she's so tough, see? she has tattoos and stuff! And piercings! she likes to kiss random girls even though she doesn't think of herself as gay or even bisexual, she just likes kissing girls because I assume the author found that hot. And of course even she can't keep away from the sheer raw magnetism exuded by said dashing writer, and then goes and gets larger breasts because she didn't think she was hot enough for men. Well awesome! BAH.
The thing is, it is very obvious that he was just writing the novels for fun in his free times, and as that, they're pretty okay, and hey, all the power to Stieg Larsson as a journalist, for all accounts he was a good guy and got really important work done and he had a bit of a crazy life (included attempted assasinations through bomb-car), if my life was as interesting I'd probably try to sneak it into a book as well; but it bothers me when people claim it's such an amazing, well thought out series, or that Salander is such a fantastic femenist character, because, eh, no. I really do think that she reads like a very straight-male kind of fantasy woman that is so kick ass and yet can't escape his charms, you know?
And then he sort of created the mary-sue to go with his avatar, a girl that seems refreshingly different on the surface to the usual political thriller novel, but becomes more and more cliched as the books go by and you find out how she's so trendy she only shops in the mac store and ikea*, rides a motorbike because she's so tough, see? she has tattoos and stuff! And piercings! she likes to kiss random girls even though she doesn't think of herself as gay or even bisexual, she just likes kissing girls because I assume the author found that hot. And of course even she can't keep away from the sheer raw magnetism exuded by said dashing writer, and then goes and gets larger breasts because she didn't think she was hot enough for men. Well awesome! BAH.
The thing is, it is very obvious that he was just writing the novels for fun in his free times, and as that, they're pretty okay, and hey, all the power to Stieg Larsson as a journalist, for all accounts he was a good guy and got really important work done and he had a bit of a crazy life (included attempted assasinations through bomb-car), if my life was as interesting I'd probably try to sneak it into a book as well; but it bothers me when people claim it's such an amazing, well thought out series, or that Salander is such a fantastic femenist character, because, eh, no. I really do think that she reads like a very straight-male kind of fantasy woman that is so kick ass and yet can't escape his charms, you know?