The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo Goes Graphic

Along with going from hardcover to trade paperback to large print to mass market paperback to CD audio to MP3 audio to ebook, the next big step for many popular titles is to become a graphic novel.  Some scoff that a graphic novel is for the illiterate or at the very best, for those who do not have the stamina or patience to read a 608-page book.  However, it really is an opportunity for an illustrator to present his or her interpretation of a novel.  The late Steig Larsson's Millenium trilogy is one such challenge, and the team of Denise Mina, Andrea Mutti and Leonardo Manco has faced that challenge and in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,Volume One, which covers about two-thirds of the novel of the same name, and met it with resounding success. True to Larssen's writing with a staccato pace and art-film-like cuts from scene to scene, it is like seeing the film without having read the book or re-reading the book in a new light.  The drawings are sharp and very Swedish.  If someone is not a reader, this would be much better than Cliff Notes, because it's not a summary and not an analysis, but simply presentation of the book in a different format.  I love it and highly recommend it for anyone -- lover of reading or not.