Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist have not been in touch for some time.Then Blomkvist is contacted by renowned Swedish scientist Professor Balder. Warned that his life is in danger, but more concerned for his son's well-being, Balder wants Millennium to publish his story - and it is a terrifying one.
More interesting to Blomkvist than Balder's world-leading advances in Artificial Intelligence, is his connection with a certain female superhacker.
It seems that Salander, like Balder, is a target of ruthless cyber gangsters - and a violent criminal conspiracy that will very soon bring terror to the snowbound streets of Stockholm, to the Millennium team, and to Blomkvist and Salander themselves.
Comment: When Stieg Larsson first got known in the early 2000s not many people would know his successful novels which we now now as the Millenium trilogy would be his greatest achievement (since he passed away not that long after) and that it would open the door for many more Scandinavian authors to be read by so many foreign readers in several countries and not just a few fans here and there.
This is the continuation of that famous trilogy, now in the hands of someone the family trusted to keep up with the work of late Larsson.
In this novel, the protagonists of the other stories, Mikael Blomkvist and Lisbeth Slander have not been in contact due to several aspects, mainly her reluctance and disappointment.
Mikael's magazine isn't doing well financially and the partners accepted the help of a particular group which injected some capital without demands. Well, at first... this means Mikael is considering ending the magazine or he would need a huge piece to make things right again. The problem is that Mikael isn't feeling motivated until something falls into his hands, namely an information about a genius man who is in danger and is trying to protect his autistic son.
When things seem to go bad, Mikael nevertheless asks for Lisbeth's help, although none of them know exactly how everything is connected to them both until it might be too late...
I've bought this book (in Portuguese) because I do consider myself to be a fan of the original trilogy. I wanted to see how the new author would pick up the story and how alike or different his "voice" would be compared to Stieg Larsson.
I confess I don't remember many details from the stories themselves, except key points and the only thing I remember from the writing is how fast paced things were and how intriguing and mysterious everything was but at the same time the "good guys" were always a step ahead when necessary. I also recall the majority of the focus was on Mikael and Lisbeth and that is, probably, what I didn't appreciate as much in this fourth story, the lack of scenes centered more on the protagonists.
I suppose it can be unfair to compare the two writers. Just being different people would obviously ut Lagercrantz in a unjust position because he is still alive to change and make mistakes/improvements while Larsson will remain in a pedestal by those who love his world building. However, if the same world is being used, not comparing things gets to be a non-action too difficult to avoid too...
The plot of this book focuses on helping a man who now wants to protect his son. But his genius abilities and work have made him a man to go after, following a certain set of situations. This "hunting someone" trope often seen in thrillers wasn't badly done, especially because readers got to know the genius guy, Fans, and he became likable. The more technical situations related how he can be found, how and why he is an important person to hunt were well done I guess but it's not a detail that I get distracted by while reading these novels. I was more concerned by the human side of things although in this new age of so much progress in technology and information sharing, things made relative sense.
What I was mostly looking for here was so see Mikael and Lisbeth interacting again, especially after how the last book in the original trilogy ended. I must say in this regard, the lack of focus on them and on their personal thoughts (except the basics and only in Mikael's case) have left me a little down. Of course it wouldn't fit them to be more extroverted, that's not what I mean. But they were apart during the whole story, they only shared necessary conversation... yes, it was fun to read some things between the lines but only the very last scene made me curious about what they could be thinking of.
Some details about their lives and choices felt a little off even though I can't explain.
The main villain in this book has also designed a complex web for things to develop and it just seems weird why this person is only now getting more focus and how some things pre determined could be accomplished. This person's existence also puts in motion a path to follow and I'm not certain it can go well... let's see.
There were some plot moves I think were avoidable. The first part of the story had too much setting up and it was a little boring here and there.
I'm going to read the next book because I'm curious to see where the goes... but I also hope it can be a more fascinating read than this one.
Grade: 6/10
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