52 Books in 52 Weeks: Book 39: "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" By Stieg Larsson

This is the first book in the wildly popular Millennium Trilogy written by Swedish author Stieg Larsson.  Larsson passed away in 2004 before this book was published, so all three of the books were published posthumously.

Mikael Blomkvist is a financial journalist who has just been convicted of libel and his future in journalism is in question. As he contemplates the short jail sentence he has received, he is contacted by Henrik Vanger, the elderly CEO of the powerful Vanger Corporation.  Vanger offers Blomkvist a freelance assignment.  He wants to find out who killed his neice, Harriett Vanger who disappeared without a trace in 1966.  Blomkvist accepts the assigment, and is joined by Lisbeth Salander, an enigmatic young private investigator. The Vanger family secrets that Blomkvist and Salander uncover will put them in grave personal danger.

This is a very well-written epic and I am looking forward to the next book in the trilogy.  It has already been made into a movie in Sweden, and a Hollywood adaptation is set to be released late in 2011.

Sojourner