Noir's The Star

If you’ve already read The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, then I have no doubt you’re hunting down the sequel, The Girl Who Played With Fire, recently published in the UK.

I was hooked after the first instalment, so on a recent trip to Paris I bought part two to read before it was published in the UK.

Stieg Larrson’s Swedish noir novels, which follow the exploits of investigative journalist Mikhael Blomkvist and computer hacker Lisbeth Salander, are so addictive that they are almost worth a special trip to the continent.

What makes The Girl such an addictive read? Larrson, an investigative journalist himself, doesn’t put a foot wrong with his debut. He writes about what he knows – Blomkvist is a believable character who wins the reader’s sympathy by messing up a complex financial investigation and then getting jailed for libel.

But although Blomkvist is a well-drawn character, whose job gives the author the opportunity to create a complex, yet captivating plot, Larsson’s most brilliant creation is his anti-heroine, Lisbeth Salander.

She is an antisocial young woman who has been victimised by the authorities and then made a ward of court after a troubled childhood.

This background allows Larrson to focus on the exploitation and mistreatment of women in Swedish society, one of the key themes of his trilogy.

Although Salander can be violent and antisocial, with ambivalent sexual preferences, she demonstrates great intelligence as a hacker for a security firm, before she and Blomkvist eventually end up working together.

As the novel progresses, the plot grows increasingly dark, but by this time I was hooked so there was no point in getting sqeamish.

Blomkvist, who publishes the magazine Millennium (which has parallels with Larrson’s own Expo magazine) is asked by wealthy industrialist Henrik Vanger to investigate the 40-year-old disappearance of his great-niece Harriet.

Vanger believes the murder is an inside job – someone from his own family carried out the killing – and so a Swedish version of the board game Cluedo ensues.

Blomkvist visits Hedestad, and Hedeby Island, the location of the cold case murder, and a large chunk of the novel is set in these remote fictional locations, away from the hustle and bustle of central Stockholm.

The locations are part of what make this novel so gripping. When the journalist reaches the scene of the cold case murder, you feel his isolation, and it is not just the temperature that brings a chill.

Larrson is careful not to reveal the murderer too quickly, and it is only after some painstaking research that Blomkvist and Salander begin to make progress.

There is a brilliant sequence involving Blomkvist sifting through old photographs, which eventually leads to a breakthrough.

I got so caught up in the pair’s quest to find the killer that I found myself caught off guard when the hunt for Harriet's murderer turns into a hunt for a serial killer.

As the investigation progresses, the killer turns his attention to Blomkvist in a bid to stop him finding out his identity.

As a result, there are a couple of rather stomach-churning scenes in a cellar which I could have done without, but fortunately the author doesn’t dwell on the gore.

Larrson appears to have higher aims than simply producing a chiller novel designed to shock.

Although the story is seen largely from Blomkvist and Salander’s point of view, Larrson reserves the right to comment, and he draws the reader’s attention to controversial issues in Swedish society.

His favourite hobby horses are the violent treatment of women, the failure of investigative journalists to nail their targets, and the moral bankruptcy of some finance firms.

Even though Hedeby is a fictional location, the novel is firmly rooted in Sweden’s geography and I would definitely like to visit Stockholm to see where Lisbeth Salander lived.

The Author: Stieg Larrson died of a heart attack in 2004 after climbing the stairs to his flat because the lift in the apartment had broken down.

He is thought to have smoked 60 cigarettes a day and was a workaholic, so it was perhaps not surprising he died prematurely.

What is surprising is that a trilogy of crime novels set in Sweden, about two not particularly attractive investigators, has now sold more than 12 million copies around the world.

What is also surprising and certainly tragic, is that the trilogy of unpublished novels was only discovered after Larrson’s death and became posthumous bestsellers.

The story surrounding Larrson’s legacy also makes interesting reading.

Larrson’s family and his long-term partner, Eva Gabrielsson, are at loggerheads over the writer’s estate.

She says Larrson left a 200-page draft manuscript for a fourth Millennium novel on a laptop, and I know that after finishing The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets’ Nest, out in the UK later this year, I shall be desperate to see how the story continues.

Gabrielsson is thought to have helped with research on the first three books, and some fans will be hoping she attempts to finish book four on Larrson’s behalf.

Larsson was an author with a knack of writing gripping page turners and there are testimonies to that effect from readers across the Internet.

Larrson was a journalist known in Britan for his work on Searchlight, the anti-fascist magazine, and he had launched his own investigative magazine Expo, which is still published in Sweden.

A Swedish film based on The Girl has been made, but there is a growing demand for an English language film adaptation.

George Clooney, Brad Pitt and Johnny Depp are all thought to be interested in playing Mikhael “Kalle” Blomkvist but who would be perfect for the part of Lisbeth Salander?

Once you have read The Girl, you are bound to have your own strong opinion on the perfect actress for the role.

l The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is published by Quercus, price £7.99.