Novel Research

"The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo" was written by Karl Stig-Erland Larsson or better known as Stieg Larsson, a Swedish journalist and writer, born August 15, 1954. Stieg Larsson changed his name from Stig to Stieg to avoid confusion with his friend who was also named Stig Larsson and who was also an author. The name change was decided by a coin toss in which Stieg Larsson lost. Larsson was initially a political activist for the Communist Workers League a photographer and a science fiction fanatic. As a science fiction enthusiast Larsson first started off writing science fiction fanzines (amateur magazines) in 1971. Stieg Larsson founded the Swedish Expo Foundation, which was made to counteract the growth of the extreme right and stop racism in schools.  In 1991 his research of right-wing extremism in Sweden led to his first book, "Right-Wing Extremism". He then began exposing Swedish extreme right and racist organizations. In 1977, Stieg Larsson trained a squad of female Eritrean People's Liberation Front guerrillas in the use of grenade launchers. He developed a kidney disease and was later forced to quit. When he returned to Sweden, he worked at the largest Swedish news agency as a graphic designer. Stieg Larsson died November 4, 2004 from climbing 7 flights of stairs to his office due to a broken lift which led to a heart attack. After his death manuscripts were found of three completed but unpublished novels in a series. He wrote them for his own pleasure in the evening when he returned from work and never tried to get them published until right before his death. The first of the three novels, "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo", originally named "Men Who Hate Women" was published in 2005. The book was awarded the glass key award as the best Nordic crime novel of 2005. The second novel, "The Girl Who Played With Fire" got the best Swedish crime novel award in 2006. And the third novel of the series was called "The Air Castle That Was Blown Up" and was published in America as "The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets' Nest" in May 2010. A fourth novel was left un-finished, his partner, Eva Gabrielsson is going to continue writing the novel on Larssons's behalf. After Stieg Larsson's death there was contraversy between Eva Gabrielsson and Larssons father and brother. A will was found stating that Stieg Larsson's money be donated to the Umea branch of the Communist Workers League, however since there were no witnesses when the will was written all of Larsson's assets went to his father and brother. Eva Gabrielsson and Stieg Larsson wanted to get married but couldn't because of a law that stated a married couple had to make their address publicly known. Due to Larsson's involvement in politics, having his address known would have been a security risk, so the two never married, but Eva Gabrielsson argued that some of her lovers money should have gone to her. When Stieg Larsson was 15 years of age he witnessed a girl by the name of Lisbeth getting gang raped, he never forgave himself for not stepping in and helping her. However the tragic rape became his inspiration for his novels and the reason why violence and abuse against women was such an important issue for him.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stieg_Larsson