Book 52 - The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest - Stieg Larsson

Woo hoo! Book 52!! This also the second "three-peat" author, having read all three books of the "Dragon Tattoo" series in the course of the challenge.

Book 52 - The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest - Stieg Larsson

As the final book of Stieg Larsson's "Dragon Tattoo" opens, Lisbeth Salander is gravely injured after being shot multiple times in the epic battle scene that ends the second book. After being flown by medevac helicopter to Sahlgrenska hospital, emergency surgery is performed to remove a 22 caliber bullet from her brain, and to mend her other wounds. She is no longer the chief suspect in the triple homicide that made her a fugitive in the previous book. The man the police now seek for those crimes is Ronald Niederman, a hulking monster of a man who suffers from a neurological syndrome that prevents him from feeling pain, and who was responsible for inflicting many of the injuries that have landed her in the Intensive Care Unit of the hospital. She is not a free woman, however. She is still a ward of the state, declared incompetent to deal with her own affairs, despite her photographic memory, massive intellect, and prodigious computer skills. She is now also facing assault and attempted murder charges, stemming from her attempts to locate the evil and mysterious Zalachenko, and is being held by police in her hospital room. Zalachenko, who in reality is Salander's father, is lying in a bed two doors away from Salander, recovering from ax wounds inflicted by her in the aforementioned battle. This is the second time he has survived an attack by Salander. The first time was when Salander was a young girl, and Zalachenko was delivering the last in a series of horrific beatings to her mother, this final one landing her in a nursing home for the rest of her life. Young Salander lashes out against her father, and her violent reaction leads to her involuntary committal in a psychiatric hospital and ultimately to her declaration of incompetence.

Locked away in ICU, unable to receive visitors and without access to the internet, Salander is powerless to do battle with forces that wish to lock her away for good. Zalachenko, a Russian agent that defected, has been harbored by a super-secret internal faction within the Swedish Secret Police. For years they have been covering up his crimes, believing his importance as an intelligence asset was such that they were willing to overlook his criminal activity, and knowing that if their secret ever got out, it would be devastating to themselves and to current and former government leaders. Salander knows at least part of the story, and putting her away in a mental institution for good is one of the steps they feel they must take in order to hide the existence of the Zalachenko affair.

People who know Salander know that she is far from incompetent, and this seems to engender a fierce loyalty towards her, regardless of what feelings she may have for them. Mikael Blomkvist, the investigative reporter from the other two books and at one time Salander's lover, is now frequently the object of her scorn. Nevertheless, Blomkvist throws almost all the resources of his magazine behind defending her and uncovering the secret organization that becomes known as "The Section." Dragan Armansky, her former employer, has also devoted much of his security company's resources to the investigation. Several police officers, in the course of their investigation, have become sympathetic to Salander's plight. Even Salander's hacker friends get in the game, once she manages to gain access to the internet from her locked hospital room, and once Armansky uses his connections to make people in the government aware of what is going on, strange alliances start to form between these investigations and those implemented by the government.

Of course "The Section" is also investigating everyone trying to figure out what is known about their organization, and what they will need to do to cover things up. At one point, a member of the Secret Police is trailing a member of "The Section," who in turn is trailing Blomkvist. In her surveillance the Secret Police officer notes that not only is Blomkvist observing his observers, but there is also someone from the Milton Security observing the whole thing.

Like the other books in the series, this is a page-turner. Although it is truly a continuation of the action of the second book, it is no longer a murder investigation, but rather a taut political thriller. The action moves along fast and furious. The plot is complex, but because of the number of separate investigations going on, there is ample opportunity for review when the various entities update each other on their progress.

I have to say, I'm sorry to have to say goodbye to Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist. I guess it's probably better to go out this way. Larsson wrote three fantastic books. There's not a clunker in the bunch.