Part 2: Consequence Analyses, 2nd blog on this part of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

But Henrik Vanger is an accomplished consequence analyser.

He brings Erika Berger to Hedestad and proposes to back the magazine with significant sums and to reorganize the Board of Directors to include the Vanger family. Mikael returns as executive editor. Why does Henrik do this? He says to get Wennerstrom. Perhaps also to calm Mikael. Hmmmmm.

Henrik proposes to announce the changes at the magazine on the day that Mikael goes to prison. Ooooh. Niiice. Stick Wennerstrom in the eye.

What this will do (it will come out later) is flush out the mole in the editorial offices of the magazine. Good thing. I think Erika sees this as a possibility but we do not hear her internal voice.

In Part 2, Mikael goes through all the material that Henrik has amassed about the day that Harriet disappeared. The material focuses on that day and on the police investigation. I notice that Henrik does not follow the suspects and family through the 37 years to the present. Much discussion is expended on Henrik's brothers (and their Nazi sympathies) during the war and until 1966. We hear about their children and grandchildren only through current conversations with family. If I were Henrik, I would have watched all these people closely through the years and just noted what they were doing. To be true to real life, this is how it would have been. I suspect most readers slide by this fault but I wonder, is this a reflection of Henrik's involvement or a literary fault to be attributed to the author.

I am inclined to think it is the author's fault. I really like Henrik, this octogenarian. I'm sure Henrik is a crafty businessman. But he has won my heart over with his stance on the Nazis, his love for Harriet, and because he saved, loved and married a German Jewish girl. He has a blind spot for his family -- either disgusted by members or reliant on members. On whom does he rely that he should not? Who does he rely on? Cecilia (lover of Mikael), Martin, Anita (who is absent since the '70's). If he were to be involved in Harriet's fate, I would feel betrayed.

I continue to be critical of Mikael's sexual relationship with the married Erika. We are supposed to admire her -- business woman, confident, genteel ... Nope. Not enticed. She is a flat character. Two dimensional. Male fantasy.

This part ends with Mikael's entrance into prison for three months.

With all my criticisms of plot and character details, I still like the voice and cadence of the novel. I enjoy the tutorial on war-time Sweden, descriptions of the land, and the peek into current Swedish culture. (How much coffee do they drink in a day? I'd be flying.)

I am intrigued by the girl with the dragon tattoo -- Lisbeth.