Lisbeth Salander shot to fame in the original book, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo. That was a while ago. She is now mature, while her work partner, the editor of Millennium newspaper, is feeling his age, and life in Sweden doesn’t seem greatly improved. THE GIRL WITH ICE IN HER VEINS continues the Scandi noir theme almost as a parody of the genre.

I have to say, I didn’t love this instalment. I read a lot of crime. I admire the original story, but by now, the hacker girl is not actually hacking. Someone is searching for a trove of bitcoin locked in a hard drive, and that’s a token, I felt, because what was needed was a password, which could have potentially been used for opening secret documents. The journalist Mikael Blomkvist, who has taken a job at the Gasskas newspaper, doesn’t have the Millennium office anymore and spends far more time boring people in pubs about Brexit than doing any investigative work. If he is talking, he can’t be listening. Mind, he is ill. All the more reason to shut up about a vote in another country, I thought.

The original story also contained sexual predators, including a serial killer. The theme of men abusing women in Sweden has continued. This makes me feel it’s really creepy and inappropriate to insert a girl of thirteen, Salander's niece Svala, who has already lived through some traumatic events such as abduction. Generally, if children are involved, it’s a sign that the content, or at least the chapters involving them, will be readable for most crime fans; however, this book is not for the nervous.

I don’t think there’s one scene that’s actually pleasant to read. Everywhere is filthy, stinking, rotting. A band of environmental activists protesting widespread mining is shown as extreme, violent, and no balanced view is provided. The Sami way of life is threatened by expanding mines and roads, which is true; but all we see of this way of life is eating reindeer. And then people are paying a lot to eat reindeer steaks in restaurants.  Salander’s hacker friend, Plague, from previous books, has disappeared. When we do see him, we’d actually rather he vanished again.

The Millennium series was begun by the late Stieg Larsson, who used his journalistic expertise to craft storylines and evidence. Karin Smirnoff has included almost no journalism in the tale, and we’re left wondering if Salander is too old to be THE GIRL WITH ICE IN HER VEINS, and if that is why her niece had to be dragged into the situation. Some readers will be keen to follow up with the series, of course; I think I’ll bow out at this point.