The Girl Who Played With Fire by Stieg Larsson

OK, so I apologize this post has taken so long. This book took me around three weeks to finish. It's long and complicated - a difficult combination for a slow, analytical reader like myself. So sorry y'all. Let's get right into it.

You may remember my previous review of Stieg Larsson's first book in his Millennium trilogy, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. As an aside, I hear Hollywood is in talks to make an English language Dragon Tattoo movie starring Daniel Craig - 007 himself - as Blomkvist. Yum! And Kristen Stewart from Twilight as Salander. Blech!

Anyhoo, I digress...In Larsson's second installment, The Girl Who Played With Fire, we revisit the lives of Mikael Blomkvist and Lisbeth Salander. Just a quick refresher: Blomkvist is an investigative journalist and quite the ladies man. Salander is an emo computer hacker with a troubled past. The book opens with Salander lounging poolside in Grenada. It seems Salander has absconded with a sizable sum of money and taken an extended vacation. This portion of the book is entirely pointless and has no bearing on the rest of the story so I shall move on.

Blomkvist and his magazine, Millennium, have been approached by a freelance journalist with a provocative and explosive story on sex trafficking. The journalist, Dag Svensson, and his girlfriend, Mia Johansson have been researching underage sex trafficking from the Baltics to Sweden for some time. Johansson is researching for her PHD thesis. Svensson's goal is to write an expose for Millennium magazine, with an accompanying book, on the crime. Both plan to personally name the customers keeping the underage prostitute ring in business - many of whom are quite prominent members of society.

That is until Svensson and Johansson turn up dead in their apartment just before the book and magazine go to print. Unfortunately for Salander, her finger prints are all over the gun and the couple's apartment. Also unfortunately for Salander, her court appointed dirtbag legal advocate turns up dead across town in his apartment. Bad day for Salander.

Salander goes underground working from her home computer and incognito to solve the murders before the police investigators catch up with her. Blomkvist, her sole ally, works from the outside to clear her name. Meanwhile, the true murderer is still on the loose and possibly hunting for Salander next.

A few observations first:

1. What is Larsson's obsession with coffee? I mean, really? His books are full of people going to get coffee, making coffee, brewing coffee, pouring coffee, offering coffee to other people. If he left all the coffee references out of his books, they would be 100 pages shorter.


2. What is Larsson's obsession with the minutia of his characters' lives? The above coffee references aside, every crumb of food they eat, every stitch of clothing they put on their bodies and every step they take is described in excruciating detail. I know authors need to paint a picture for a novel to be engaging but there has got to be a line somewhere.

OK, I had to get that off my chest. It's been bugging me.

I didn't enjoy this book nearly as much as the first in the series. It was very hard get in to, for one thing. Both books are slow starters but Dragon Tattoo grabbed me much earlier and kept me engrossed, while Fire really drug on without ever snagging me fully.

And to make matters worse, it's a cliffhanger. I HATE cliffhangers. When I finish a book, I want it finished, dammit! This book took me three freaking weeks to read and now I have to read another book the same size or bigger just to see what happens. Never mind that I was going to read the next one anyway. It's the fact that I HAVE to read it that chaps me.

Another problem I had with this book, more so than the first, was the deadend story lines. I mentioned Salanders magical mystery tour of the Caribbean above. I thought maybe something would come of it but nada. There is also a small deadend subplot that involves Salander's studying mathematical theory. We get it - she's a genius. Don't talk about it for chapters on end unless it's going to have some bearing on the plot. My point is Larsson seems to have lost his edit button between the two books. Either that or he was consciencely looking for filler and in that case, he should have nixed the filler and combined the second and third into one book.

All that being said, there are some good things about the book. I know it hasn't sounded like it so far but trust me. It's decent. Thankfully, it's less violent than the first. That's a huge plus. And there are parts of the book that are quite engaging. Larsson can weave a story. The world he has created is exact and precise. Every detail is covered which, as I mentioned, can get tiresome at times. But the man had an imagination, that's for sure. He had the ability to create a world in his brain and put it down on paper to the smallest detail. That impresses me.

Overall I give The Girl Who Played With Fire two and a half bows . There's a good chance I would have given it a higher rating had it not been a cliffhanger. And it was really hard to judge the book on it's own. Comparisons to the first were inevitable so the above rating is really a reflection of my opinion of the second as compared to the first book. Dragon Tattoo was so good. Fire just couldn't live up to it. I am wholly optimistic, however, that the third installment, The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest redeems the trilogy. I have already purchased it but will be taking a short respite before reading it - a palate cleanser of sorts - and reading a book or two on the "to read" shelf.

In the meantime, let me know what you thought of the book. I know there's a bunch of you out there that disagree with me. But until then, happy reading!

Living Dead in Dallas by Charlaine Harris

Sorry all you tens of readers out there. I haven't blogged for a week. I'm currently reading The Girl Who Played With Fire by Stieg Larsson and it seems to be taking me a while to get through it. So, I thought I would honor the new True Blood season currently airing Sunday evenings on HBO by talking today about Living Dead in Dallas by Charlaine Harris. I will do my best to separate the TV show from the book because there are differences.

First, a bit of background since this is the second installment in Harris' Sookie Stackhouse novel series. Our heroine, Sookie, is a waitress in Bon Temps, Louisiana. Sookie is not like other girls. She can read minds, a gift that she really doesn't enjoy. The world these novels inhabit is rife with supernatural creatures. At the forefront are the vampires who have recently "come out of the coffin". Due to a new synthetic blood called True Blood, the vampires as a community have chosen to enter mainstream society and make themselves known. There are also shape shifters (Sookie's boss, Sam, likes to turn into a collie), maenads, werewolves and who knows what else. Sookie is in love with a vampire by the name of Bill Compton who was turned vampire during the Civil War.

The book opens with a murder. Lafayette, the fry cook at the bar where Sookie works is found dead in Sheriff Andy's car. No one knows what happened, least of all Andy who was actually in the bar tying one on at the time of the murder. Sookie, as usual, feels it's her duty to find the killer. Why the police force in Bon Temps is so incompetent, I don't know.

In the midst of Sookie's investigation/snoopiness, Eric Northman, current vampire sheriff of Louisiana, 1000 year old former viking, proprietor of Fangtasia, the hottest vampire bar in Louisiana, and uber hottie (Exhibit A)

sends Sookie on a telepathy assignment to Dallas, Texas. It seems a local Dallas vampire has gone missing and they need Sookie's special powers to help find him. Bill accompanies her.

As usual, Sookie gets herself in all kinds of trouble. She discovers that a local anti-vampire church has kidnapped the missing Dallas vampire and is planning to sacrifice him at dawn in a ceremony called "meeting the sun". In other words, the vampire will be tied to a stake and left out to burn when the sun rises while a bunch of vampire haters cheer. Sookie offers to infiltrate the church in order to get information but the church has been tipped off to Sookie's affiliations and she finds herself kidnapped too and added to the morning's sacrificial festivities.

Will Sookie escape the clutches of the anti-vampire church? Will Sookie save the vampire from meeting the sun? Will Sookie solve Lafayette's murder? Will we ever get to see Eric in the spandex disguise at the end of the book on the TV show? I know the answers but I'm not talking. Read the book lazy bones!

It goes without saying that Harris' Sookie Stackhouse novels are not deep reading. These aren't books that future literary scholars are going to be studying. BUT, they are fun. The characters are wacky and the world Harris has created is captivating. You have to wonder what supernatural creature Harris is going to pull out of her bag of tricks next.

However, I found the story in this novel a little weak, at least compared to the first novel in the series, Dead Until Dark. It was really two stories in one: Lafayette's murder and Sookie's assignment in Dallas. The two were completely unrelated and created a disjointed storyline. Harris obviously didn't have enough meat on either story so she just combined them into one book. I can't fault her that. Overall, I give Living Dead in Dallas 3 1/2 bows It's not Shakespeare but it's fun, mindless reading. I highly recommend it for the beach or pool. Happy reading everyone!

The Douchiest Douche That Ever Douched

Begin Rant-

I happened upon this USA Today article a while ago and I haven't been able to rinse the taste of bile out of my mouth since reading it. This article seems innocent enough. An interview with best selling author Nicholas Sparks and the star of the new movie based on one of his books, Miley Cyrus. I'm not even going to touch Miley here because she actually comes off as the more rational of the two in this interview. And that's not saying a lot. No, my vitriol is reserved solely for Sparks and his obvious delusion of grandeur complex.

You may know Sparks best by the movies based on his novels. A Walk to Remember, Nights in Rodanthe, and Message in a Bottle among others. I will give Sparks some leeway with his argument that his books are "love stories, not romances". Whatevs. I personally don't see the distinction. But he is quite adamant, much like a politician who argues the difference between having an inappropriate relationship with a woman who is not his wife and banging all the strippers at the Kitty Kat Klub.

But, I have to draw the line when he compares himself to Hemingway. After picking up A Farewell to Arms he says, "That's what I write." Um, no. You don't. Hemingway wrote some of the most simple yet eloquent prose the literary community has ever seen. You write melodramatic (despite his argument in the interview) tripe that's only a small step above Harlequin Romances. And then in the next breath claims "there are no authors in (his) genre. No one is doing what (he) does." Does this choad really think he invented a literary genre? Are young, eager minds at the University of Iowa's Writers Workshop studying his groundbreaking masterpieces?

Don't get me wrong, we all have our dirty little secrets - our secret go-to books when we don't really feel like thinking a lot. The ones we don't want to be seen reading at the corner Starbucks. I read Anita Shreve novels and Sookie Stackhouse books. I'm not entirely proud of it but everyone needs a break now and again. The difference being these authors aren't parading around in USA Today claiming to be the next Hemingway. Most likely because they have the self awareness to know they are not the next Hemingway.

And what's his problem with Cormac McCarthy. McCarthy must have stolen his girlfriend in high school or something.

End Rant-

The Blind Side by Michael Lewis

Some of you lovely readers might not be aware of this, but before Sandra Bullock won an Oscar for her portrayal of Leigh Anne Touhy in the movie The Blind Side, there was actually a book. Oh yes, I'm not lying. Often times, Hollywood actually makes movies based on books. Crazy I know. And often times, books are written about real live people. Such is the case with The Blind Side.

First I will give a little synopsis of the book and then provide a lot of commentary because this book is not the least bit what everyone thinks it to be. Least of all my boss, Lynnette, who purchased this book to read before she watched the movie. She made it three pages in and then promptly handed it over to me to read. She wanted me to read it first so I could tell her where to start reading it. In essence, where it got good.

Michael Oher was a poor, black kid from the wrong side of Memphis, TN - that is the West side. In a strange turn of events, he lands in an East side, rich, white private Evangelical christian school for his Junior year. Some concessions were made since Michael didn't really have the grades to make the cut at the highly academic school. His free pass came in the form of his body. Michael was 6'5", 350 pounds. At age 16. All the coaches at the school saw a wonderful asset in Michael so he was allowed in.

The Touhys, the rich, white Evangelical family that eventually adopts Michael, entered his life gradually. Michael had no real support system. He was one of 14 siblings to a mother addicted to drugs. Michael mostly slept on whichever friends couch who would have him, up to and including his first semester at Briarcrest, the new Christian school. Sean Touhy, a former Ole Miss basketball star and current owner of 85 Taco Bells, took an interest in Michael. Sean himself was an American success story having come from nothing and made himself a millionaire. He saw a little of himself in Michael.

The Touhys involvement in Michael's life began slowly. Sean set up an account in the cafeteria for Michael's meals. Leigh Anne, Sean's wife, took Michael out clothes shopping since he only seemed to have one pair of jeans and one t-shirt to wear. Eventually, Michael began sleeping on the Touhys' couch. After that, Leigh Anne simply set him up in his own room. Just like that, Michael had become part of the Touhy family.

Eventually, college football scouts got wind of Michael. They didn't care that Michael wasn't particularly good at football (yet). All they needed was one glimpse at his size and they were ready to throw a full scholarship at him. But before that could happen, Michael needed some work. His grades were crap - he was barely able to read. And the position that all the scouts were interested in him playing - left tackle - he had never played before. Sean and the Briarcrest football coaches spent the summer teaching Michael the basics of the left tackle position. Leigh Anne got to work getting Michael a tutor to improve his grades.

Michael's senior year was a glorious success. He was named Tennessee State Football Player of the Year and his grades had improved considerably. He was being courted by all the big colleges and he had been formally adopted by the Touhys. Michael's life had gone from nearly an inner city statistic to future NFL star in a short year and a half.

OK, so Michael's story is really only half of this book, dear readers. Many people don't know that the book is actually called The Blind Side - Evolution of a Game. That game is football and that evolution makes up the other half of the book. The book begins with the story of Lawrence Taylor and Joe Theismann. Anybody who knows anything about pro football knows the story I'm speaking of. Lawrence Taylor (or LT more commonly) is better known these days for his crack addiction and more recently his penchant for sex with underage girls. Joe Theismann, well, he's known for what Lawrence Taylor did to him. If you're curious, google it but don't say I didn't warn you. I'll just leave it at this:

This half of the book is very heavy on football theory and strategy, stats and statistics. I watch football. I'm a fan. I know most of the big name players. I know my way around a football game well enough. I may not know the difference between pass defending and pass interference, or the difference between offsides and encroachment (one is defense, one is offense - I don't know which). This is what I have a husband for and he came in very handy while reading this book. "Honey, what's a blitz?" "Honey, what's spearing?" My point being, I know the basics of football but I still needed help with this book.

Lewis' point was that there was an evolution that had started a decade - maybe two - before Michael Oher even set foot on the football field. That evolution was a need for a big enough, strong enough, athletic enough left tackle to protect the quarterback's blind side. The idea being that most quarterbacks were right handed therefore making their left side their blind side. If that blind side was adequately protected, the quarterback was left free to complete his passes down field.

So, these chapters on football theory and strategy were inserted in between the chapters about Michael's transformation to give the readers some background on what had made Michael such a valuable commodity in the first place. Lewis also, most likely, bored a lot of readers (not the least of which my boss) who picked up the book to read a heart warming rags-to-riches story only to be bombarded with football statistics. I blame this on the movie. I haven't seen it yet but I would venture to guess the movie doesn't mention the improvement of pass completions when going from a traditional offense to a West Coast Offense. God, how do I even know these things now! I need to watch a fashion show and reprogram my brain ASAP!

This book was hard to rate since, as I stated above, half of the book is football theory, the other half heart warming rags-to-riches. I would give the football theory half two bows and the rags-to-riches half four bows so we will go with an average of three bows.If you are an average reader and can get through the history and theory chapters without being so bored as to give up, you'll find the book quite enjoyable. If you're a football scholar, like my husband, you will find the book riveting. If you don't know the first thing about football or sports in general - and don't care - you're screwed. Rent the movie. Happy reading, or maybe this time I should say happy watching!

War of the eReaders

No review today, dear readers. Today I would like to address a very important and life changing decision that has been been nagging me for some time: should I buy an ereader.

For those of you unfamiliar with the term, ereaders are basically electronic books. They are little electronic devises designed specifically for storing and reading books, magazines, newspapers, etc. Here are the leading models:



Left to right: Amazon's Kindle, Barnes & Noble's Nook, Sony's Reader and Apple's iPad

Those are just a few of the models on the market right now. Type "compare ereaders" in Google and you'll get an idea of the full scope of the market. Each model varies a tad in their specific features but the concept is the same. You download books directly to the device. The devise marks your place automatically. Some allow you to highlight excerpts to refer back to whenever you like. Some allow you to share books with friends and family who have the same model as you. Amazon and Barnes & Noble specifically provide a large selection of free books (books that are no longer under copyright) to their ereader owners. All provide their owners with an easy and compact way to store all their books rather than cluttering up shelves and taking up valuable space in their homes.

The problem with this decision is that I am a traditionalist. I enjoy my books. Not just reading them. That's a given. I enjoy the feel of the pages in my hand. I enjoy collecting them; filing them on my bookshelves after I've finished; selecting the next one. I love building my library and sometimes go in there for no reason but just to look at all my books.



Yes, I've read all of them and I am almost out of space.

Also, I enjoy attending author readings and book signings. There's no way to have an author sign your ereader now is there. I have two signed first editions in my collection that I prize more than just about anything else I own: David Sedaris' When You Are Engulfed In Flames in which the inscription mentions my boobs and Lisa See's Shanghai Girls. Signed first editions just aren't an option with ereaders.

However, I also see the benefit of these devices and these benefits are what is making my decision so hard. First and foremost is cost. Not the cost of the device itself. I think most run around $250.00 or so. I am speaking of the cost of the books. Needless to say, I spend a LOT of money on books. I love hanging out in book stores and often go in for a one specific book and exit with an arm load. I just find so many other wonderful books I want to read while browsing. To make this habit a little easier on my pocketbook, I have tried to start acquiring my books at discount, second hand stores and fairs such as Half Price Books and the Planned Parenthood Booksale. EReader books are generally significantly cheaper to download than buying a physical book. And as I mentioned above, many have a large selection of free books. FREE BOOKS PEOPLE!

Another benefit is convenience. I take a book with me wherever I go whether it be work or doctors appointments or vacation. There's always a book in my purse. So logically, a compact device that stores many books would be attractive to me. Especially for vacation and travel. My good friend Jamie and I always laugh about how many books we each take on vacation with us. We're like little traveling libraries. Jamie has since purchased a Kindle and loves it. But she travels quite a bit more than I do so the purchase was a bit more easy for her.

Anyhoo, needless to say, I'm no closer to making a decision. As of right now, I think I am going to stick with the centuries old, tried and true method of physical books. But each time I enter Barnes & Noble and see that Nook display and I start playing around with the display model, the 21st century gal in me starts to come out and I start to covet the new technology. If any of you have an ereader and have any further insights, I would much appreciate your input. Until then, happy reading!

The Piano Teacher by Janice Y. K. Lee

Today I will be reviewing The Piano Teacher by Janice Y. K. Lee. This is Lee's debut novel, having previously been an editor at Elle Magazine. Let's see if she should have stayed in fashion, shall we.

I'm a little unsure where to start with this book since I found it a bit disjointed. But I shall do my best. We will start with the title character. Claire is newly married and newly arrived in Hong Kong where her husband is an engineer overseeing the building of a water reservoir.

The year is 1952 and Hong Kong has recovered remarkably from World War II and been placed safely back into British hands as a colony. Claire barely knows her new husband (she married him to escape her overbearing mother) but being British herself, is quickly introduced into Hong Kong's colonial society. An accomplished piano player, she accepts a position with a wealthy Chinese family, the Chens, teaching their daughter, Locket, the piano.

It is through her position as the piano teacher that she meets Will Truesdale, the Chen's British chauffeur. Will and Claire quickly and unceremoniously begin an affair with each other. However, Claire is blissful ignorant of Will's past during the war. And also blissful unaware that she is, through her relationships with Will and the Chens, inserting herself into a long simmering conflict that is about to come to a head.

The book alternates between Claire's story in 1952 Hong Kong with Will's story in 1941 Hong Kong. Will arrives in Hong Kong with no real plans to stay, until he meets Trudy, a beautiful and vivacious half Chinese, half Portuguese heiress. Will and Trudy fall madly in love and enjoy a life of leisure and privilege together, going to all the most glamorous parties and restaurants. That is, until war breaks out and the Japanese invade Hong Kong. The Hong Kong and British militaries surrender after only a few short days and Hong Kong is plunged into violent Japanese rule. Will, as a British citizen, is placed in a kind of prison holding camp for foreign citizens of governments that opposed the Japanese. Trudy is allowed to stay on the outside due to the favor of a new Japanese "benefactor".

It is here that the book takes a turn toward a more intrigue and war time double cross filled story line. Prior to this point, the book had been more of an insight into Hong Kong colonial society - the dinners, the opulence, the amahs (Chinese female servants). It almost becomes a different book entirely. I guess that could have been the author's intention given that Hong Kong became an entire different place once the war broke out. It could have been a way of paralleling the story to the history.

The book definitely provides a very interesting look into British colonial society. Half a world away from "the Mother Country", British citizens set up their own little mini British communities in these colonies. Hong Kong was no exception. Wealthy Hong Kong Chinese were educated in Britain and often described as being more British than the British themselves. Because of their wealth, they were allowed into the British colonial society but they were few and far between.

The book also provides a startling look into the cruelty and barbarism of the Japanese toward the people they conquered during WWII. I've read a few other novels set during this time period - both in Hong Kong and Shanghai - and none sugar coated the atrocities that occurred at the hands of the Japanese. I'm sure this is the case with all wars, regardless of the nationalities, and maybe it's just the fact that I've read more books about the Japanese during WWII but it seems they were particularly barbaric and inhuman. Truthfully, I don't care to broaden my horizons on this front and actually wonder why I have chosen to read so many novels that deal with these subjects in the first place.

Overall, as I said before, I found the book disjointed. The two stories never seemed to converge logically. Claire, the title character for god sakes, never really seemed to fit into the overall plot and it made me wonder why the author had chosen to include her story at all. The pre-wartime and post-wartime story of Will and Trudy was much richer and more compelling. It was just confusing.

But the writing itself was lovely. Lee has a knack for describing scenes and characters and especially the clothing the characters are wearing but we would expect no less from a former Elle Magazine editor, now would we. So I give The Piano Teacher three bows. It truely was fair to middling. Neither good nor bad, neither hot nor cold. You get the point.