31. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

by Stieg Larsson (644 pp.)

This is my 7th book this year with 600 or more pages. I'm on fire. I'm going through my "to read" pile and pulling out all the fatties.

When we were in Europe in March I saw stacks of these Stieg Larsson books everywhere. I'd never heard of them and thought about buying all three. They were so popular. They must be good. But I didn't have room to carry three more books with me.

I bought this one when I got home and I have to say I'm mystified by the rabid popularity. It's a nice enough page-turning thriller. But nothing exceptional. I thought the pace was sludgy and there was some structural weirdness including a mindbendingly dull email exchange section near the end that ground the book to a halt. I'm not going to run out and read the other two, but if someone leaves them in a beach cabin where I happen to be staying (should I be so lucky) I'd read them then.

30. The Passage

by Justin Cronin (766 pp.)

This is my 5th book this year over 700 pages. Remember the library gave out bookmarks and stuff as prizes when you read books during the summer as a kid? I feel like I should get something for reading so many giant books.

I 95% LOVED this book. It's a post-apocalyptic super-scary vampires take over the world story. Really, there isn't an original idea in here. It's all in the execution. Great characters. Fun to read. If I have a complaint, it's that I wish he'd dropped some of the ideas and developed other ideas more. By the time you get to the end there's a major development and resolution every couple of pages. I also thought there were some loose ends that I would have liked to see tied up a bit more. But overall: recommend.