Yay or Nay? 
Yay! (76%)
Yay! (76%)
Consensus: The final book in the Millennium Series picks up where the last one left off in terms of story and quality. In order to understand it you’ll need to read the others, but the whole trilogy is worth the time and effort.
Description: The stunning third and final novel in Stieg Larsson’s internationally best-selling trilogy.
Lisbeth Salander — the heart of Larsson’s two previous novels … [more]
Shop online for “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest” by Stieg Larsson:
30 Book Reviews for “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest” by Stieg Larsson
- Of Larsson’s three books, “Hornet” is least able to stand on its own. It introduces no new story lines, just continues right after “Fire’s” conclusion. Knowing the earlier books and characters is necessary to make “Hornet” not just interesting but readable…. It’s a testament to Larsson’s creation that the poignant final scene induces real pathos, even to a reader forced to work so hard to get there.
- Larsson breathlessly takes up his tale the day after book No. 2, “The Girl Who Played With Fire,” left off…. His palette is broader when it comes to showing the corruption of power and the righteousness of idealism. Given what is known of him … we know where he stands. But his characters have nuance and depth.
- Book 3, gratifyingly, brings the action back to a place somewhat resembling reality and, in so doing, restores dignity to the franchise…. And for fans of the first two books, there are plenty of the Larssonian hallmarks they have come to love…. Reading Stieg Larsson produces a kind of rush — rather like a strong cup of coffee.
- It’s unfair to burden “The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest” with failing to close out the series correctly, but this disappointing installment is all delay, no payoff…. How disappointing that a promising series had to go out like this.
Published the 27th day of May, 2010 in The Onion A.V. Club | Reviewed by Ellen Wernecke | Full Review
- “Hornet’s Nest” is panoramic in scope with many fascinating characters realistic and grotesque, who are enmeshed in a high-stakes struggle for power and wealth.
Published the 30th day of May, 2010 in Pittsburg Post-Gazette | Reviewed by Michael Helfand | Full Review
- To have written these three novels may have killed Larsson, but he left a monument behind, a modern masterpiece.
Published the 24th day of May, 2010 in The Washington Post | Reviewed by Patrick Anderson | Full Review
- “Hornet’s Nest” is thinner than the first book, “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo,” its characters less developed than in “The Girl Who Played With Fire,” the middle (and best) work and the one in which Salander became memorably full-bodied. Still, it’s often riveting, and the last 200 pages quicken, so you’re sorry it ends…. Perhaps one reason I was disappointed by “Hornet’s Nest” is I want this story to continue. Despite its flaws – they are about overreach, not lack of ambition – Larsson’s Millennium trilogy is a singular literary achievement.
- With the first two books, Larsson created enough literary electricity to light the Dallas skyline. Hornet’s Nest, alas, just gives off a few tantalizing sparks before going sadly dark.
Published the 23rd day of May, 2010 in The Dallas Morning News | Reviewed by Joy Tipping | Full Review
- “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest” is a more subdued affair than its action-heavy predecessors…. Fans of the first two books might miss the Hollywood-blockbuster action sequences and wish Salander — the series’ most compelling character — were more of a presence, but “Hornet’s Nest” is still a satisfying finale to Larsson’s entertainingly suspenseful trilogy.
- The quality of the writing is fine…. One of the faults of “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest” is that it spends far too much of its first 100 or so pages rehashing the previous two novels…. We do need some reminding, as there are a number of complex threads involved, but a little editing would have gone a long way…. Nevertheless, “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest” is a superior page-turner that doesn’t leave you feeling disgusted with yourself for not being able to put it down.
Published the 21st day of May, 2010 in The Globe and Mail | Reviewed by Peter Robinson | Full Review
- Although Larsson’s plotting is powerful and his ancillary characters interesting, it is Salander’s willpower and grit that captivate readers and have turned these books into international best-sellers…. Larsson twists these multiple threads tightly into a cord that pulls the reader through the book, page after page. The ending is everything you might have wanted in a story such as this.
- The book slows down a bit during an early, lengthy passage about the Swedish secret service, but otherwise Larsson’s story flows without a hitch. Saying goodbye to these characters we’ve come to love is hard. But this miraculous series is worth any sorrow we may feel at its end.
- It’s also a thoroughly gripping read that shows off the maturation of the author’s storytelling talents.
Published the 20th day of May, 2010 in The New York Times | Reviewed by Michiko Kakutani | Full Review
- Larsson carefully buttons all buttons, ties all laces, reaching back to “Tattoo” and “Fire” – and there are many…. Larsson was one canny literary architect: Just when the book seems wrapped, we have one more explosive climax coming…. The Millennium trilogy is, so far, the trilogy of the millennium.
Published the 23rd day of May, 2010 in The Philadelphis Inquirer | Reviewed by John Timpane | Full Review
- “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest” is a rewarding entertainment, and a satisfying solution to the mysteries that surround Lisbeth Salander. But the enchantment of the Millennium Trilogy is not what Salander suffers, but how she triumphs.
- There are not a lot of hearts pounding or chills running down spines in “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest.”…. If anything, “Hornet’s Nest” luxuriates in even more of the pointlessly meticulous, step-by-step detail that marked the first two novels.
- What saves the enterprise is Larsson’s absolute commitment to the material. He knows how to set a scene and milk it of every last drop of suspense…. “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest” succeeds in its primary objective, bringing to a satisfying conclusion the dramatic arc begun in the first volume…. Undoubtedly an extraordinary achievement for a fledgling novelist.
Published the 23rd day of May, 2010 in San Francisco Chronicle | Reviewed by Michael Berry | Full Review
- Even with the faster pacing, the text is still peppered with needless details about everyday activities…. But mostly, Larsson tells a tense tale that pits national security against civil liberties, and a brainy but oddball young woman against some violent foes. Even with its flaws, “Hornet’s Nest” grabbed — and held — my attention.
Published the 23rd day of May, 2010 in St. Louis Post-Dispatch | Reviewed by Harry Levins | Full Review
- “Hornet’s Nest” has somewhat less kick-butt action than the previous books, with more of the story unfolding in courtrooms, boardrooms and newsrooms…. “Hornet’s Nest” doesn’t seem to have been written as a finale — there are many loose ends left in Salander’s story, and the ending is, if not the cliffhanger of Fire, a new emotional frontier.
Published the 23rd day of May, 2010 in St. Petersburg Times | Reviewed by Colette Bancroft | Full Review
- Reading this one feels like work. It’s more like a first draft than a polished novel…. But instead of complaining about the third novel in the trilogy, let’s end with a big thank you for the spellbinding first two.
- “Hornet’s Nest,” which carries on without pause from its predecessor, finds Salander near death from a bullet wound to her head and awaiting desperate medical measures. Mostly, she remains confined there, but physical passivity does not imply helplessness. Give this kid a smuggled computer and a lot of help from her few allies and you can be sure she will confound her smug, well-connected enemies.
Published the 24th day of May, 2010 in Los Angeles Times | Reviewed by Richard Schickel | Full Review
- The end of more than seventeen hundred pages of clearly narrated and well-plotted thriller brought me much more satisfaction than dismay…. I lingered over pages, languished in them, not wanting the story to end even as the book moved inexorably toward one of contemporary fiction’s most triumphant trial scenes.
- Larsson has produced a coup de foudre, a novel that is complex, satisfying, clever, moral…. Clever twists and turns…. This is a grown-up novel for grown-up readers, who want something more than a quick fix and a car chase. And it’s why the Millennium trilogy is rightly a publishing phenomenon all over the world.
- I cannot think of another modern writer who so successfully turns his politics away from a preachy manifesto and into a dynamic narrative device. Larsson’s hatred of injustice will drive readers across the world through a three-volume novel and leave them regretting reaching the final page; and regretting, even more, the early death of a master storyteller just as he was entering his prime.
- Getting to the point where the action can begin involves about 100 pages of slightly bewildering political backstory and a flood of new characters. But Larsson is a sharp enough writer to handle that. What really disappoints is the flatness and predictability of the characters, old and new. Most men are baddies who stay bad. And all the women are goodies who stay good…. All that said, Larsson’s books are certainly page-turners.
- The book is a reminder of Larsson’s strengths and a few weaknesses. Blomkvist’s vanity is trying, as every woman he meets falls for him, and the reliance on violence as a solution to loose ends is uncomfortable. “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets’ Nest” is not really a standalone read like the earlier novels, but the completion of the trilogy confirms Larsson as one of the great talents of contemporary crime fiction.
- Larsson’s work is original, inventive, shocking, disturbing and challenging. But many of his plots and main characters … are too exaggerated to believe…. The second book’s excess of violence is not repeated in the third…. Stieg Larsson’s immensely readable Millennium novels are far from flawless; they are too long and often unnecessarily complex. But they’ve brought a much needed freshness into the world of crime fiction.
- Encompasses brilliant storytelling, vivid and pacey action, a “whydunnit” and political polemic as well as a detection thriller, and features a couple of fictional characters who are as memorable in their own way as Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson…. The conclusion to the Millennium trilogy is just as fine as the preceding two volumes. How desperately sad, then, that Salander and Blomkvist will have no further adventures, as surely no-one could depict them quite like the late, great Stieg Larsson.
- His final book can be accused of heaping too much plot between two covers,.. but he is remarkably agile at keeping multiple balls in the air. But it wouldn’t really matter if he weren’t a skilled craftsman because Salander is such a bravura heroine … that we’d willingly follow her through any bramble bush of a plot.
- The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets’ Nest is not just the extraordinary conclusion to the trilogy, but a work that contains its own fully-rounded plot…. Brilliant.
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Thanks much for the suggestions. I sooo take pleasure in reading your web site.
A great conclusion to the trilogy.This book is the third and final novel in the “Millennium” trilogy written by Stieg Larsson and published after his untimely death during 2005
It’s our editorial policy at the Lit Review to let you know if a book is being sold under two different names in the actual title of our post about the book, as we did with “Imperial Life in the Emerald City: Inside Iraq’s Green Zone” by Rajiv Chandrasekaran (AKA “Green Zone”). Suffice to say, I thought it a little pointless to entitle this page “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest” by Stieg Larsson (AKA “The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets’ Nest”). Did you miss it? On the West side of the Atlantic, the apostrophe is before the “s,” not after it. Whether or not North American hornets actually prefer to nest singularly in contrast to their more communal European cousins still remains to be proven.