Reviews tagging 'Kidnapping'

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

76 reviews

nightshade_1's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

₊꒰  ⊹ ࣪—˚Final thoughts 

⥼~-✰-~⥽ ☽ ˚•̩̩͙✩•̩̩͙˚＊☾ ⥼~-✰-~⥽
Started : 10th  October 
Finished  12th October 
╭⊹ 𐙚 ₊ ° ⊹ ♡

The premise of this book was really good at first it started off really slow I don’t think I would’ve picked this up if it wasn’t for a buddy read something to tick off my tbr really now! 
I really enjoyed the concept on how dark and mysterious this was.

||The characters in this was good it did sort of grip you in ways trying to solve a missing person case moving to a new city can be quite daunting in one go.
At times this book turned out really slow and then fast in places where you can read a big chunk and then so little it was hard to process in times what was going on.😭
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||I really enjoyed the dark and mysterious vibe for sure this would be a really good read to read in the dark for that sort of vibe I loved how it also had family complications whilst in the journalist system that was interesting to see. 
||

||Lisbeth is literally queen in this book ! Such bad ass character gave no rats ass to get information she always speaks her mind even when people are in the wrong! 
There was so many characters aswell mikael for example to say that he sounds like a dead beat father I still believe he still cares in heart even after having a love affair with someone else even if he was in the wrong doing that to his own family.||

||Erika: it took me a long while to get to understand Erika but she loves  her job with a passion and confident women in her work doesn’t take no for an answer||

The ending: 
|| Im not sure how i likd the ending i get there was a. twist and turn with the father and harriet but overall i did like the whole story itself||

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Child abuse, Death, Gore, Mental illness, Rape, Sexual assault, Torture, Violence, Blood, Kidnapping, and Toxic friendship

kxl_knight's review against another edition

adventurous emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

4.5

Well written, terrifying moments with small senses of hope and humor.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicide, Torture, Violence, and Kidnapping

isabeljmiller's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Incest, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Torture, Trafficking, Kidnapping, Stalking, and Murder

miss_anthrope's review against another edition

challenging dark reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Child abuse, Death, Domestic abuse, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Incest, Mental illness, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Suicide, Torture, Violence, Forced institutionalization, Blood, Antisemitism, Dementia, Kidnapping, Murder, and Injury/Injury detail

aleyajo's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

You know shits bout to go down when they put coffee on the stove.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Body horror, Child abuse, Death, Gore, Incest, Infidelity, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Racism, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Blood, Antisemitism, Kidnapping, Car accident, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Sexual harassment, and Injury/Injury detail

Minor: Medical content and Dementia

skramer00's review against another edition

dark mysterious sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Violence, and Kidnapping

olive_oil_'s review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

slow at first and then fucked UP

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Rape, Sexual violence, Violence, and Kidnapping

_annika__'s review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child abuse, Death, Incest, Mental illness, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Torture, Kidnapping, Stalking, Car accident, Murder, and Sexual harassment

adventurouspotato's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

This is a tough book to review. The mystery at the heart of it is compelling and well laid out but there is a lot of other stuff in this book which slows the pace down incredibly for most of the first half as well as the last 50 pages. I think the beginning of this book is pretty bad, with infodump problems in the first couple chapters. The Wennerström affair and the future of Millennium was just not that interesting to me and the book outlines it in too much dry detail. 

It took until part 2 for this book to even start being interesting, and it takes until part 3 for any progress to be made on the case! But the mystery itself is well laid out and interesting, and while I guessed a couple things, namely that

Harriet was still alive,

most of it was a complete surprise. The end of part 3 and beginning of part 4 was a real page turner, but then we saw more of a secondary plot at the end which I didn't care much about.

The characters are also interesting, especially the title character, but I had some issues with their relationships with one another. Is it really too much to ask for

any of the main female characters not to fuck Blomkvist? I think his relationship with Cecilia was a bit interesting cause it could have compromised the case, but otherwise, was it really necessary to spend that much time on the subject of his sex life?

Salander is even more complicated in this regard.

I think her experience of SA and how she responded to it actually gave an important look at her character, which I do have to respect since it's kind of rare for that to work. Her revenge was really satisfying and shows how she takes care of things on her own even though it may be more dangerous. 

You can also see how her circumstances affects her attitude towards the case and other male characters. She has no idea what it's like to have healthy boundaries or relationships, whether platonic or sexual, and it's no surprise when she randomly asks her boss if he thinks she's attractive or when she tries to have sex with Blomkvist even though he's old enough to be her dad. This is the first time Salander actually trusts someone as a friend and she basically tries to sabotage it by reverting to a dynamic she understands.

This all makes sense for her character, but I hate that Blomkvist goes along with it! For him it's just sex but it should be clear that Salander is vulnerable and that their relationship would be healthier without that. Blomkvist isn't always perfect but I'm not sure if we're supposed to treat this as a mistake since there isn't any consequences for him and their relationship remains pretty much the same, just now with sex. I think this is a missed opportunity for Salander to either be confronted with healthy boundaries in a platonic relationship for once, or to have a conflict between them because their sexual relationship isn't super healthy for their friendship and working relationship.

Anyways, I'll wrap up with some more small thoughts. This book is really Swedish and it doesn't try to explain linguistic or cultural things to a foreign audience for the most part, except for some reason it used Fahrenheit for the temperature which just killed me as a Canadian. It also makes constant reference to books, newspapers and magazines characters read, almost none of which I had heard of. For all I know they are fictional, but I assume they are well known to Swedes. I thought this surprising lack of localization was interesting given this book's international success.

Also, most characters are referred to by last name way more frequently than I would expect, which is probably a Swedish cultural thing? But it makes it confusing since the Vanger family are all called by their first names, but "Vanger" is specifically used for Henrik Vanger. Another example is that Birger Vanger is called "Birger" while Erika Berger is called "Berger". This confusion could have been avoided if she was called by her first name in the text!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal death, Incest, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Rape, Torture, Antisemitism, and Murder

Moderate: Alcoholism, Animal cruelty, Domestic abuse, Kidnapping, Death of parent, and Fire/Fire injury

allymcbroom's review against another edition

dark tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? N/A
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.25

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Cursing, Death, Domestic abuse, Eating disorder, Incest, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Forced institutionalization, Kidnapping, Grief, Stalking, Car accident, Death of parent, Murder, and Sexual harassment