Stieg Larsson

“In real life, people are integrated into society. That's what happens in my books as well. Minor characters don't just walk in and spout lines, they interact and have an effect on the events. It's not an isolated universe.”

“I can be a regular bitch. Just try me.”

“This is so much money that it scares the shit out of me. I don't know how to handle it. I don't know the purpose of the company besides making more money. What's all the money going to be used for?”

“She had put on make-up in a colour scheme that indicated she might be colourblind.”

“I know what kind of things I myself have been irritated by in detective stories. They are often about one or two persons, but they don't describe anything in the society outside.”

“I'm a fast writer, and crime novels are easy to do. It's much harder to write a 1,000 word article, where everything has to be 100 per cent correct.”

“But she wished she had had the guts to go up to him and say hello. Or possibly break his legs, she wasn't sure which.”

“What she had realized was that love was that moment when your heart was about to burst.”

“From a purely physical standpoint she didn't have a chance, but her attitude was that death was better than capitulation.”

“History is reticent about women who were common soldiers, who bore arms, belonged to regiments, and took part in battles on the same terms as men, though hardly a war has been waged without women soldiers in the ranks.”

“Harley-Davidson," she said. "Sweet.”

“You walk around feeling like a teenager and immortal your whole life, and suddenly there isn't much time left.”

“I am not altogether confident of my ability to put my thoughts into words: My texts are usually better after an editor has hacked away at them, and I am used to both editing and being edited. Which is to say that I am not oversensitive in such matters.”

“In ordinary detective novels you never see the consequences of what happens in a story in the next book. That you do in mine.”

“Consider this a fair warning.”

“Dear Government... I'm going to have a serious talk with you if I ever find anyone to talk to.”

“It did no good to cry, she had learned that early on.”

“Some of the writers I've praised are Sara Paretsky, Val McDermid, Elisabeth George and Minette Walters. Strangely enough, almost all are women.”

“Friendship- my definition- is built on two things. Respect and trust. Both elements have to be there. And it has to be mutual. You can have respect for someone, but if you don't have trust, the friendship will crumble.”

“13NOTESShe hesitated. For two years she had kept as far away from Mikael Blomkvist as she could. And yet he kept sticking to her life like gum on the sole of her shoe, either on the Net or in real life. On the Net it was O.K. There he was no more than electrons and words. In real life, standing on her doorstep, he was still fucking attractive. And he knew her secrets just as she knew all of his. She looked at him for a moment and realized that she now had no feelings for him. At least not those kinds of feelings. He had in fact been a good friend to her over the past year. She trusted him. Maybe. It was troubling that one of the few people she trusted was a man she spent so much time avoiding. Then she made up her mind. It was absurd to pretend that he did not exist. It no longer hurt her to see him. She opened the door wide and let him into her life again.”