The introverted, anarchical punk-goth hacker heroine of the Girl With the Dragon Tattoo novels had always intrigued Karin Smirnoff. In fact, the eponymous Lisbeth Salander was the reason Smirnoff read all six books in the series. So when the Swedish writer was approached to continue Salander’s story and write a seventh novel, her answer was an automatic “Yes”.
Smirnoff is the first woman to write for the Millennium series, which began with a trilogy by journalist Stieg Larsson. In November 2004, soon after submitting manuscripts for the first three novels to his publisher, Larsson climbed the stairs to his office as the lift was out of order. When he got to the top, he suffered a fatal heart attack. His books were published posthumously, and have become one of Sweden’s biggest literary exports. By 2019, the series had sold more than 100m copies worldwide.
