Many thanks to NetGalley and Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, and Anchor for providing me with an eARC of The Girl in the Eagle's Talons in exchange for my honest review!

Having read the first two books in the Millennium series (as well as seen the David Fincher adaptation of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo), I was intrigued by what The Girl in the Eagle's Talon could bring. Yes, I certainly held onto some skepticism toward the choice to keep this series running after Stieg Larsson's passing, but I was also trying to keep an open mind, especially since this is the first Millennium book to feature a woman writing it. All that being said, I think this is just okay. It isn't horrible, but it isn't outstanding, either. It's simply another entry in the series that boasts some gritty thrills and is particularly compelling whenever Lisbeth Salander (who's grown to become a favorite fictional character of mine) is on the page. While Svala does feel like a miniature Lisbeth in a derivative way, I still enjoyed the dynamic that grows between them.

But at the end of the day, this book doesn't seem all that necessary. It comes off as the publisher doing everything they can to keep this series chugging along in spite of the fact that it just doesn't have that much fresh spirit after the loss of Larsson. Now, it's not as if his writing was completely flawless (I especially think his characterization of Lisbeth could get clunky to the point where you can really tell it's a man trying to write a woman into life here), but he had a pretty damn good grasp of his series that made it riveting to read. Too bad we're not getting that here, even as Smirnoff is doing her best to revitalize the series. In addition, I found the villains to be one-dimensional, and it made me appreciate the more well-written and menacing baddies in the first two books. Oh, and why, why, why does this series keep having to fall back on using depictions of rape and pedophilia to show how monstrous the villains can be? I'm just so over it by now. Come on, be more creative. There are other ways, smarter ways, to display the evil that these scoundrels can commit.

Overall, I'm officially rating The Girl in the Eagle's Talons 2.75 out of five stars, which I'm rounding up to three stars. I'm not planning on ever rereading it, but I'm still glad I checked it out. When the next Millennium entry comes out, I might pick it up.

This is a continuation of the Millennium/Lisbeth Salander series, written by a different author than the original series. I enjoyed the original series like many so was curious to read this installment. I found the plot a bit hard to follow with multiple points of view being used throughout the book, and the different characters. The writing was OK, I'd say serviceable to decent, but not great. As others mentioned there may be some translation issues. I will say my preference would be to focus more on the original characters, Lisbeth especially. It's certainly true to the original books but the sexual violence/violence against women just gets to be too much- even in the beginning of the book, which makes it a bit off putting. I think there is some promise with the series continuation but it just needs some refinement.

I read this as a stand alone book, I have not read any of the previous books in this series. As a stand alone I think this book is good. It was entertaining and has plenty of action to keep you engaged.

Lisbeth Salander is brought to Sweden after learning she is the next of kin to a 13 year old girl, Svala Hirek. Only after taking on Svala, does she discover that the girl is her brother’s daughter, the brother that was out to kill Lisbeth. Svala’ mother is presumed to be dead, but Svala believes differently and sets her sites on finding her mother. While in Sweden Mikael Blomkvisit shows up in Lisbeth’s life again. Little do they know they are both on the same mission to take out Marcus Branco. Marcus wants to bring wind farms to remote areas, but one home steadier stands in his way. Women go missing and Mikael Blomkvisit’s grandson is kidnapped leading to a exciting end.

I struggled through this story. I hadn’t read the series previously, but loved The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo movie. I don’t know if the translation was part of the hinderance, but it never caught my attention. I read it to finish it, not necessarily because I was enjoying the book.

Thank you to NetGalley, Knoph, Pantheon, Vintage and Anchor, and Karin Smirnoff for the eARC.

This is one of those books that you just need to end. From a Christmas explosion in summer, to wind farms, to men with no legs, to horrific and graphic rape scenes, to an orphan, to a kidnapping, to a wedding, to a child lock picking expert, to everything in between, this book was...weird.

I was really excited to see Lisbeth Salander back but this didn't read like the originals that I loved so much and it just never clicked for me. I listened to the audio which was fine but at times quite hard to understand and some of it was overacted.

I really wanted more Salander too, she didn't even show up until at least a third into the novel and generally felt like a peripheral character.

The wind farm aspect interested me and some scenes were excellently crafted, but overall, I was uninterested and bored. There were a lot of characters and storylines and it took too long to get back around to the ones I was interested in.

Overall, this one wasn't for me and I'll probably be skipping any additional offshoots of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

Thank you to Knopf, PRH Audio, and NetGalley for the copy.

I really enjoy the original Dragon Tattoo series, but unfortunately this book didn’t have the same appeal for me. I wanted to love it, but I found it slow and kind of boring. I struggled to get through the beginning and it never got much better. It’s a shame to see a well loved series decline so much.

While I have enjoyed reading this series, I could not finish this installment. It was too disjointed. The writing was not the best. Maybe it had to do with the translation. I guess it is time to move onto another series.

The Girl in the Eagle’s Talons by Karen Smirnoff
Memorable Lisbeth Salander swoops in for a second act in Karen Smirnoff’s The Girl in the Eagle’s Talons. Remaining remarkably consistent with Steig Larson’s series while delivering an explosive new tale, Smirnoff opens with intense new characters and swift action.
Marcus Branco wants to change the north by bringing wind farms to remote areas. Because the Branco Group will see enormous profits from the endeavor, he’s willing to do whatever it takes to make this project happen. He has the means and the militia and anyone who gets in his way will disappear or die. Someone has already vanished, Svala Hirek’s mother, Marta.
Streetwise Svala is extremely brilliant for a thirteen-year-old. But more than that, she’s inherited her father’s unique trait; she feels no pain. Her father was murdered years ago and now that her mother is gone, Social Services reaches out to Svala’s nearest kin, her aunt Lisbeth Salander.
Lisbeth has no idea that Ronald Neiderman, her insane half-brother—who she killed –has a child. The last thing Lisbeth wants is to take care of a kid. However, when she meets Svala, there’s a distinct connection, and she decides to help out. Though Svala enjoys the lavish attention her aunt pays her—expensive hotels, new clothes, and shoes to replace her worn bedraggled high tops—she is on a mission to find her mother. She knows that her disappearance has something to do with the Branco Group, the company installing those wind farms.
It's a given that Mikael Blomkvist will cross Lisbeth’s path again. His daughter Pernillo is about to marry Henry Salo, who is caught between working for the Branco group and fighting to start a life with Pernillo and her son. When the wedding turns red and someone abducts Mikael’s grandson, Mikael calls the one person he can count on, Lisbeth Salander.
The Girl in the Eagle’s Talons delivers white-knuckle tension and adrenaline. Smirnoff’s follow up to the Lisbeth Salander series will leave you wondering what’s coming next for these beloved characters.
By Tracey S. Phillips, author of Best Kept Secrets

Thank you to #Netgalley for the ARC copy of this book.

I don't know why I keep reading these. after the initial 3 books written by Larsson, they are not worth reading. I think I liked 1-3 so much that I'm hoping to get that initial love for Lisbeth back.

This one didn't even feel like Lisbeth. She has always been a strong, badass woman, and she felt soft.

Unfortunately, this didn't hit the mark like the original trilogy did for me, and it's a DNF at 20%.

Special thanks to Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage and Anchor and NetGalley for the ARC of this book.

Oh man what a letdown in this series. A new author and it feels like the characters are dumbed down.

Lisbeth shows up in Chapter 13 for example.

Unfortunately I was very letdown and cannot give this book a good recommendation I'm sorry to say.

I'm not sure how to rate this book. I read the original trilogy and while I enjoyed them, I found the writing very black and white and pedantic at times. I had hopes that a female author would not include violence against women, but that was not the case. While it's not as extreme as the other books, it's still present and is only included to make the bad guy extra bad. No thanks.

Despite the violence, the meandering plot and murky ending, the book is very readable. Lizbeth is called to a small northern town to look after her orphaned niece. Blomkvist is conveniently in the area for his estranged daughters wedding. Mikael has recently retired and proves to be fairly useless.

Sigh... I had high hopes for this one, but it fell short. I listened to the audio courtesy of PRH Audio (y'all are amazing! I love being able to listen to my reads these days).

I thought perhaps with a new author, Karin Smirnoff, I would get reinvested in the series, but unfortunately, nothing can match the magic created by the original author.

There was a nice return to Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist but I think perhaps this will be the end of me reading. I have seen many reviews that talk about how much they liked the new twists and turns and I think others will find this an enjoyable and reinvigorating read for the series. It just missed the mark for me.

I have loyally read every book in this series, from the original trilogy to the following three books by David Lagercrantz. I was pleasantly surprised by the Lagercrantz ones; they were well written, continued the characters stories in an interesting way, and took on social topics that made sense for the story.

In this seventh book, the series has a new author and it's just not the same. Whereas Lagercratz elevated the series, this book feels like it's just gratuitous violence and dumbing down of the characters. Lisbeth did not even show up until Chapter 13. I did not care about the social topic and struggled to read this book.

Unfortunately, I cannot recommend this book and it may be the last one I read in this series.

Thank you to Netgalley for the advance copy for review.

This was...not good. Gratuitous rape and violence. Unnecessary POVs/plot lines. A Lisbeth mini-me. A non-ending. So disappointing. I was hoping the misogyny would be less having a female author but I swear there was more!!

2.5 stars rounded down
I was hopeful that this latest book in the Millennium series would be better with a woman’s touch. Sadly, it was not. The book had a lot of misogyny and sexual violence that had nothing to do with the plot. I almost DNFed this book, but then Lisbeth popped in at about the 20% mark, so I decided to keep going. The plot revolves around a mob-type group trying to set up a wind farm in Sweden. There is also Svala, Lisbeth’s niece, trying to find her mom, who went missing. This did not feel like the same Lisbeth and Mikhail, and they had very little interaction. Two positives are the short chapters which helped to move the story along, and the new character Svala.

I'm always up for seeing what Lisbeth Salander has been up to. In this latest installment (prefaced by a cast of characters in the series, thank you very much), the setting is in northern Sweden, very rural, very small town. So small town that each character has some kind of connection to some other character, including Lisbeth and, of course, Mikael Blomkvist. And it's touted as the first in the series written by a woman.

The plot has suspense. There are some easter eggs. Women are going missing, there's a land grab scheme going on, there are very very bad men and characters with questionable motives. The misogyny is over the top (this is the Millennium series, after all, but it's the main reason this is 3 stars and not 4), although the women get some payback. The scheming is over the top, one passage I highlighted with "oh brother" had a real Dr. Evil vibe, although I think Smirnoff was going for serious over cartoony.

Salander doesn't show up until about a fifth of the way into the book. She's thrown together with her niece, a safe-cracking whip smart teenager. The odd couple pairing is the highlight of the novel, there's real admiration and affection between them. Salander is growing up.

There were some plot holes, there were questions left unanswered, there were twists that were very convenient. But I'm hooked and will keep reading the series, even without the mind-blowing intricate plot machinations that defined the Larsson books.

My thanks to NetGalley and Knopf for the ARC. The Girl in the Eagle's Talons was published in August 2023.

Corruption and greed in Norrland.

Adverse weather compounds the difficult rescue of Lisbeth's niece's mother in northern Sweden. In addition, the criminals have their sights on the grandson of Mikael Blomkvist as they try to manipulate the boy's stepfather, Henry Salo. The plot focuses on the control of wind power and mining rights in Gasskas.

This 7th in the Millennium series has been taken over by a new author, the first female to tackle the complex character that is Lisbeth Salander. I enjoyed reuniting with the old, familiar characters and meeting new ones, especially the niece, Svala. I thought the narrative moved forward at a good pace and enough backstory was included to remind the reader of people and places that might have been forgotten.

Lots of action and great descriptions of the setting made this an excellent continuation of a series that I've always enjoyed. I look forward to more installments as changes come for both Lisbeth and Mikael.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for this e-book ARC to read, review, and recommend.

This is a very complicated novel that continues the Lisbeth Salander series. I started reading these novels years after the original movie came out and jumped at the chance to do an early review.

Mikael’s daughter’s wedding is in Gasskas in Swedish Lapland. The husband-to-be is essentially the town mayor and it becomes clear that he is in over his head with a windmill deal. He thinks he is negotiating with one of three companies who will be given some of the land but fails to realize he’s got some scary dudes (and one dudette) who will stop at nothing to take over the entirety of the land.
Then a little boy is kidnapped and all hell breaks lose.

Meanwhile Lisbeth becomes guardian to her niece Svala who she didn’t really know anything about given her father was Lisbeth’s brother who following orders from Lisbeth’s father, tried to kill her. Svala and her mother Marta are involved with some seriously sketchy business and murder and rape are critical parts of their job.

The two plots merge and well, you can probably guess how it ends. Murder, mayhem, and destruction.

Tw: murder, sexual assault, gun violence, drugs.