Though all three contain many of the same characters, the first is very much a stand-alone story, while the third book is a continuation of the story that began with the second. Those already familiar with the three books will already be aware that calling them a ‘trilogy’ is not entirely accurate. The huge popularity of the Millennium Trilogy was a turn-off for me and is probably why I have been avoiding it.īut the books are exactly what one requires as a travelling companion – large, engrossing and easy to read.

Perhaps it is my late-Gen-X sensibility, but the minute something achieves mass-popularity, I don’t want to know about it anymore. The first novel is comfortably the best of the series. I decided it was time I turned to something I had been avoiding – Steig Larsson’s Millennium Trilogy, which I bought for less than $7 for each book. She bought a stack of Agatha Christies for around $3 each. At a bookstore at Connaught Place in New Delhi my wife and I found what we needed. With a large English-speaking population and cheap labour and materials, you can find good books at incredible prices in India. They demand you be rested, attentive, comfortable and pensive.įortunately solutions were easily available. These are not novels to be read when tired, jet-lagged and crammed into an economy class plane seat or a rural train in India, beset by noise and jolted repeatedly. I thought I would gain new appreciation for these books by reading them as I traversed Rajasthan and Himalcha Pradesh, particularly as I would be visiting the town where much of Kim was written (Bundi) and where some of it was set (Shimla).īut these were a poor choice. I decided to take two books I had read in the recent past – Rudyard Kipling’s Kim and EM Forster’s A Passage to India. On a recent 6 week trip around Northern India, I chose badly. In the past I have been well-served with Atlas Shrugged, Catch-22 and Shantaram but as I say I was lucky, I did not put too much thought into what to take. It can’t be too artistic, too trying, too innovative requiring too many neurons to appreciate and digest. It needs to be intriguing, entertaining, engaging or stimulating enough that it will keep you turning the pages not matter how tired, jet-lagged, hungry, cold or hot you are. Something that can be read cover to cover on one plane ride will not suffice. You need a large volume that will occupy those many hours spent on planes, trains and buses, in airports and train stations. Without much thought or planning I have been able to accompany my vacation with a book that gave me what I needed. In the past I have been very fortunate in choosing books to travel with. Stieg Larsson’s immensely popular Millennium Series offers readers an entertaining diversion but is not without its flaws.

The Millennium Trilogy by Stieg Larsson