Stieg Larsson

Karl Stig-Erland "Stieg" Larsson was a Swedish writer, journalist, and activist. He is best known for writing the Millennium trilogy of crime novels, which were published posthumously, starting in 2005, after he died of a sudden heart attack. The trilogy was adapted as three motion pictures in Sweden and one in the U.S. (for the first book only). The publisher commissioned David Lagercrantz to expand the trilogy into a longer series, which has six novels as of September 2019. For much of his life, Larsson lived and worked in Stockholm. His journalistic work covered socialist politics, and he acted as an independent researcher of right-wing extremism.

He was the second-best-selling fiction author in the world in 2008, owing to the success of the English translation of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, behind the Afghan-American Khaled Hosseini. The third and final novel in the Millennium trilogy, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest, became the bestselling book in the United States in 2010, according to Publishers Weekly. By March 2015, his series had sold 80 million copies worldwide.

Larsson had originally planned a series of 10 books and had completed two and most of a third when he began looking for publishers. At the time of his death in 2004, only three had been completed, and although accepted for publication, none had yet been printed. These were published posthumously as the Millennium series.

The first book in the series was published in Sweden as Män som hatar kvinnor (literally "Men who hate women") in 2005. It was titled English-language market as The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and was published in the United Kingdom in February 2008. It was awarded the Glass Key award as the best Nordic crime novel in 2005.

His second novel, Flickan som lekte med elden (2006, The Girl Who Played with Fire), received the Best Swedish Crime Novel Award in 2006 and was published in the United Kingdom in January 2009. The third novel, Luftslottet som sprängdes (literally "The castle in the air which was blown up"), published in English as The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest, was published in the United Kingdom in October 2009 and in the United States in May 2010.

Larsson left about three-quarters of a fourth novel on a notebook computer, now possessed by his partner, Eva Gabrielsson; synopses or manuscripts of the fifth and sixth in the series, which he intended to comprise an eventual total of ten books, may also exist. Gabrielsson has stated in her book "There Are Things I Want You to Know" About Stieg Larsson and Me (2011) that she feels capable of finishing the book.

In 2013, Swedish publisher Norstedts contracted David Lagercrantz, a Swedish author and journalist, to continue the Millennium series. Lagercrantz did not have access to the material in Gabrielsson's possession, which remains unpublished. The new book was published in August 2015 in connection with the 10-year anniversary of the series, under the Swedish title Det som inte dödar oss (literally "That which doesn't kill us"); the English title is The Girl in the Spider's Web.

The fifth book in the Millennium series was released in September 2017. The Swedish title is Mannen som sökte sin skugga (literally "The man who hunted his shadow"), and the English title is The Girl Who Takes an Eye for an Eye. The sixth book in the Millennium series was released in August 2019. The Swedish title is Hon som måste dö (literally "She who must die"), and the English title is The Girl Who Lived Twice.