Stieg Larsson

Today I picked up The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets Nest. It was lying in waiting under the end table next to the magic recliner. I always have a backlog of books because I am a voracious reader and because I believe the only time I am vulnerable to death is when I am between books.
Given that belief you would think I would immediately start a new book upon completion of another, but I don't. The time between books is a delicious gamble.
The trilogy is awesome. I read it at my own pace. Not one after another. Which is why I was thrilled to get sucked right back into the story after about two sentences this morning.
Given the sorry state of my brain, and my advanced age, you would think I'd have to review the previous book before sliding back into the sequel.
Not true. It all comes flooding back.
Maybe because reading is my love, as are M&M peanuts.
Stieg Larsson is the author.
What a bizarre biography.
Interesting man.
He worked a couple of years in the post office in Sweden and became an active member of the Swedish left wing movement. In 1977 he started working as a graphic designer and did that for 22 years. In 1991 his first book was published, on right wing extremism which he sought to expose and which resulted in death threats. At that time he had plans to write a series of detective novels but didn't get to it for ten more years.
The man smoked sixty cigarettes a day and ate crap and worked relentlessly.
He died of a heart attack at the age of fifty BEFORE The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets Nest got published.
Think about that. This series is huge. As of 2010 it had sold 20 million copies. In 2008 he was the second best selling author in the world. He died in 2004.
He didn't get to reap the benefits of any of his success.
I got into a zen thinking thing. Would it have been better if he lived to get rich? To receive acclaim?
Or was the writing enough. I know as he wrote he was ecstatic. Good writing is its own reward. Its own sweet release.
The world has been swept up in the characters and stories that he wrote and that is an amazing legacy. Brief relief for the great unwashed.
Obviously it would have been better for him personally to swell his bank account and ease his existence in this world and I wish he got the chance.
But on a larger scale the success is the same.
Speaking selfishly, if there is any money to be made at all from words that I put together, I would prefer to be alive to spend it. Preferably on a case of Crown Royal XR Extra Rare, which would set me back $1,559.88. A modest sum. A humble reward.
But I do take pleasure from knowing that should I remain a low wage earner for the rest of my life, there are a hell of a lot of words out there that will survive me forever.
These books are so easy to read and so captivating that you forget from time to time that they have been translated from Swedish and take place in Sweden.
Until you read: "Blomkvist took the tunnelbana to Medborgarplatsen and walked to Allhelgonagatan."
Page 52 in the hardcover edition.