Sarah

1: Graceling ★★★★★
#2: Fire ★★★
#3: Bitterblue ★★
#4: Winterkeep ★★
#5: Untitled - will not be reading

2★

I found Bitterblue to be an incredibly annoying character and thought this book was way too long and convoluted for its own good. Getting more and more nervous about reading Winterkeep!

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You can read this review and more like it on my book review blog.

I have been plodding my way through this book for weeks, trying to figure out how I'm going to properly review it without tearing it apart. I dragged myself through the first 200 pages and then put out a call for help. After consulting with many people, all of whom had already read the book, I concluded that the book was to get better and I would not DNF it. I put it on pause to read Everything, Everything and then continued my way through it. And, well, here are my thoughts.

I think just about everyone has heard of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo at this point. The whole series is famous and the first book has been made into a movie–twice. Somehow I hadn't gotten around reading it until now. I had been intending to for years, but the opportunity just never presented itself. A couple years ago I ended up getting a copy and immediately forgot about it completely. Recently I rediscovered it and decided it was time.

I usually keep my reviews spoiler-free, but in the interest of discussing all my issues with the book, I'm going to warn you all that there will be rampant spoilers throughout this review. I also want to put out a content warning for this book for rape, assault, incest, and plenty more. It was quite the read.

I'll start off with the problem that almost caused me to DNF this book: it is almost entirely exposition. The first 200 pages alone are exposition. The first half of the book was, in my opinion, dry and boring and unnecessary. It is a translation, so it's possible that something was lost here. I understood, to some extent, why so much setup was needed, but in my opinion the payoff just wasn't there.

None of the characters were compelling to me. I understand books with unlikeable characters, but here the main characters were boring and two-dimensional. Blomkvist was bland and I couldn't fathom why women were throwing themselves at him left and right. Salander had so much potential as a Strong Female Character™, but just ended up being more like an unrealistic caricature. She didn't feel like a real person and because of that, she just wasn't interesting to me. All of the romantic and sexual relationships had no chemistry and felt entirely unnecessary.

Sexual assault was essentially just used for shock value throughout the entire novel. Salander is assaulted multiple times. A graphic assault scene is bookended by sex scenes, which is a huge pet peeve of mine as, in my opinion, it contributes to the sexualizing of rape and assault (a huge problem in media). I really didn't think I got anything out of the repeated assault except for motive for Salander's distrust of men (I mean same, amirite).

The plot was in and out. Like I said, it kind of dragged on for a while, but it got interesting once things finally picked up. If the story had been condensed, I think I would have liked it a lot more. After the main mystery was resolved, it slowed down again. I almost wish the entire Wennerström plotline had been left out. It provided motivation and background for Blomksvist's character, but really took up too much time and space and could have been avoided.

Apologies if this was a little meandering, I'm struggling to get all my thoughts put together concisely. I feel badly for not having much good to say about this book, but I was deeply disappointed by it. I'm intrigued about the Swedish film and intend to watch it, but I do not plan to continue reading the series.

Definitely not a new favorite, but there were some standouts in this collection. The Last Rung on the Ladder in particular had me tearing up at the end. I have to give King credit, because even the stories I didn't like were compelling enough for me to zip through them. Sometimes I can struggle with his writing, but it really worked for me here. I did find myself unsatisfied with some of the pieces and as always the fatphobia (etc.) is rough, but overall I did find it worth reading. My average rating for these stories came to 2.74 stars.

Jerusalem's Lot - 3.5 ⭐️
Graveyard Shift 4 ⭐️
Night Surf - 2 ⭐️
I Am The Doorway - 4 ⭐️
The Mangler - 4 ⭐️
The Boogeyman - 3 ⭐️
Gray Matter - 3 ⭐️
Battleground - 2 ⭐️
Trucks - 2 ⭐️
Sometimes They Come Back - 3 ⭐️
Strawberry Spring - 3 ⭐️
The Ledge - 2 ⭐️
The Lawnmower Man - 2 ⭐️
Quitters, Inc - 2 ⭐️
I Know What You Need - 2 ⭐️
Children of the Corn - 3 ⭐️
The Last Rung on the Ladder - 4 ⭐️
The Man Who Loved Flowers - 2 ⭐️
One For The Road - 2.5 ⭐️
The Woman in the Room - 2 ⭐️

This review can also be found on my blog.This was generally quite readable, but I didn't find myself invested in the main character at all. The romance was half-baked, didn't feel real, and was only included so the LI could be fridged in order to further motivate Bill. The casual/explicit racism in this runs rampant: King is constantly using the n-word, gives a black side character a recurring joke about being a literal slave to the white MC (to the point where the kid calls him “Massa Hodges”), and makes the villain vilely racist in a way that I felt was just not necessary. Hodges has read there are wells in Iceland so deep you can drop a stone down them and never hear the splash. He thinks some human souls are like that.Both Bill and the aforementioned side character, Jerome, treat a second side character, Holly, like absolute garbage because of her mental illness. She seems to suffer from only anxiety and OCD, but gets treated like she's a lunatic because she takes... lexapro. Lexapro is an extremely common medication used for anxiety and depression. I felt like mental illness was being hugely stigmatized here, especially because Holly is treated like she's soft and useless. King is almost able to flip the trope he's using, but falls short. Instead of having Hodges and Jerome admit their preconceived notions were wrong, he has them say shit like “it's humbling to find he's been scooped by a Lexapro-dependent neurotic.”The last sound she makes on earth–everyone should be so lucky–is a laugh.Anyway, I just didn't have any patience for this. You can write realistic, flawed characters while still challenging problematic viewpoints, which wasn't accomplished here. To add insult to injury, I didn't find anything compelling about the plot itself. While I could sit down and read for sizeable chunks of time, I was still just reading for the sake of finishing it and not because I truly wanted to. Mr. Mercedes was honestly a huge disappointment and I have no plans to finish out the trilogy.Blog Twitter Instagram Facebook