Hot n Cold about The Girl who Played with Fire

Though I am typically old-fashioned when it comes to reading, I decided to take on my first i-pad novel a few days ago when stuck on a 6 hour plane ride with no alternative entertainment besides my AP Bio book. I've come to see that there are some perks to the electronic novel life; you read more quickly, it's easy to carry around, and they have this nifty little thing where you can see what percentage of the book you have read. One downside (besides the fact that it doesn't feel as homey to curl up on a rainy day with a mug of tea...and an i-pad) is that you can't go back pages. Since I can't look back a few chapters, I can only tell you that a murder occurred around 32% of the way through The Girl Who Played With Fire. Just before the murder occurred, one of the two main characters was placed at the scene of the crime in a rather suspenseful situation.

The book (or the series for that matter) is written in third person but basically follows one character at a time. I don't know the official term for the point of view I am describing, but I guess I would call it third person personal. For example when it is following main character Mikael Blomkvist, the reader is privy to Blomkvist's thoughts and he is the center of attention. There is a paragraph break and a space to clarify when the point of view changes to follow another lead character. As mentioned before, one of these lead characters was being followed to the scene of the crime. The novel did not follow her until the time of the murder, but instead left us hanging a few hours beforehand. So far, the reader has only heard of and about the murder from other sources, mainly journalists and police investigators.

This account I am giving is from 44% of the way through. This means that 12% of a 648 page novel has been dedicated to making the reader wonder if our main character is a killer. It is so frustrating, for a couple reasons. Reason one is the most obvious - I'm curious and I want to know. I have faith in the character, but the situation is fuzzy so I want to know her motive for committing the crime if she did in fact do so (which I find doubtful). Reason two is that the character under suspicion is my favorite character. I experienced a similar frustration in the first book of the series; I continually find myself wishing that the story followed her more. She is an ingenious character and there are times where I think that author Stieg Larsson does not embrace her potential enough. I want to know more about this mystery girl, or I want him to further develop the mysterious nature of her character. In fact, I don't even need to know much about her background, I just want to spend more time following her so I can get a grip on the way her mind works. Not only does she having a haunting past, she is extraordinarily removed from social life, has a photographic memory, and an insane yet persuasive set of morals.

The third reason I find this part of the book frustrating is that I haven't learned much. I learned some cool facts about hunting ammunition and a few new characters have been introduced, but that is about all that can show for the past 12% of the book. I know, it's supposed to be suspenseful, and evidently that suspense is effective, but often times it feels the suspense is pushed too hard. It's no longer just come on, I want to know! It has reached a point of come on, get me through this boring part please! I have never read a book that is straight through action - no overly drawn suspense. I have read plays of this fashion (namely The Pillowman) but never a book. Even Harry Potter, of whom I am a die-hard fan, has his share of seventy to a hundred page dry spells. It is in books like these, like Harry Potter like The Girl Who Played With Fire where it drives me crazy when the suspense goes on too long, because the characters have such potential that it is too good to waste time lolly-gagging when you could be developing.

Do me a favor and comment on this post with a great action packed novel that you have read that does not have stale suspense in it. I cannot think of a single one, and this makes me wonder if the stale suspense is what makes the action so good. Are boring parts of a book necessary to make the reader appreciate the thrilling sections? I would like to be able to answer this question with an "oh hell no" but I don't have the evidence to back it up. So help me out if you can!