Millennium is a series of crime novels originally conceptualized by Swedish author Stieg Larsson, who completed the first three books before his death. David Lagercrantz penned the next three, and Karin Smirnoff is in the midst of writing the third trilogy. The two primary characters in the saga are Lisbeth Salander, an asocial computer hacker with a photographic memory, and Mikael Blomkvist, an investigative journalist and publisher of Millennium magazine.
Eight books in the series have been published. Larsson planned for 10 installments, but completed only three before his sudden death in 2004. That first trilogy was published posthumously as The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo in 2005, The Girl Who Played with Fire in 2006, and The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest in 2007. Larsson's novels were originally printed in Swedish by Norstedts Förlag, with English translations by Steven T. Murray published a few years later, by Quercus in the United Kingdom and Alfred A. Knopf in the United States.
In 2013, Norstedts Förlag commissioned Swedish author David Lagercrantz to continue the Millennium series with Larsson's characters. George Goulding was the English translator. The Girl in the Spider's Web was published in 2015, followed by The Girl Who Takes an Eye for an Eye in 2017 and The Girl Who Lived Twice in 2019.
In November 2021, publishing house Polaris acquired the rights to the series from Larsson's estate and announced a new trilogy of books written by Swedish author Karin Smirnoff, with English translation by Sarah Death. The Girl in the Eagle's Talons was published in 2022. The Girl with Ice in Her Veins followed, in 2024.
The first three books have been translated by many publishers in over 50 countries; by March 2015, 80 million copies had been sold worldwide. With Lagercrantz's first two installments, the Millennium series had sold over 100 million copies worldwide by May 2019, making it one of the best-selling book series in history. The series has been adapted into Swedish and American films, as well as comics from Vertigo Comics and Dupuis.
Production
Origins After his death, many of Larsson's friends said the character of Lisbeth Salander was created out of an incident in which Larsson, then a teenager, witnessed three of his friends gang-raping an acquaintance of his named Lisbeth, and did nothing to stop it. Days later, wracked with guilt, he begged her forgiveness — which she refused. The incident, he said, haunted him for years afterward, and in part moved him to create a character with her name who was also a rape survivor. The veracity of this story has since been questioned, after a colleague from Expo magazine reported to Rolling Stone that Larsson had told him that he had heard the story secondhand and retold it as his own.
In the only interview he ever did about the series, Larsson stated that he based the character on what he imagined Pippi Longstocking might have been like as an adult. Another source of inspiration was Larsson's niece, Therese. A rebellious teenager, she often wore black clothing and makeup and told him several times that she wanted to get a tattoo of a dragon. The author often emailed Therese while writing the novels to ask her about her life and how she would react in certain situations.
Larsson's friend and colleague Kurdo Baksi believes the author was also influenced by two murders in 2001 and 2002: Melissa Nordell, a model killed by her boyfriend, and Fadime Şahindal, a Swedish-Kurdish woman killed by her father. Both women were killed at the hands of men or as victims of honor crime. To Larsson, there was no difference, and the "systemic violence" against women highly affected and inspired him to take action against these crimes through his writing. Eva Gabrielsson, Larsson's longtime partner, wrote that "the trilogy allowed Stieg to denounce everyone he loathed for their cowardice, their irresponsibility, and their opportunism: Couch potato activists, sunny-day warriors, fair-weather skippers who pick and choose their causes; false friends who used him to advance their own careers; unscrupulous company heads and shareholders who wrangle themselves huge bonuses... Seen in this light, Stieg couldn't have had any better therapy for what ailed his soul than writing his novels."Gabrielsson, Eva, Marie-Françoise Colombani, and Linda Coverdale. "There Are Things I Want You to Know" about Stieg Larsson and Me. New York: Seven Stories, 2011.
People who knew Larsson, such as Baksi and Anders Hellberg, a colleague of Larsson's in the 1970s and 1980s, were surprised that he wrote the novels. Hellberg went so far as to suspect that Larsson is not the sole author of the series, reasoning that Larsson was simply not a good enough writer. His partner Gabrielsson has been named as the most likely candidate, due to her chosen wording during at least one interview that seemed to imply co-authorship. She later claimed she had been misquoted. In 2011 Gabrielsson expressed anger at such accusations and clarified: "The actual writing, the craftsmanship, was Stieg's. But the content is a different matter. There are a lot of my thoughts, ideas and work in there." As an example, she said he used her unfinished book about architect Per Olof Hallman to research locations for the Millennium series, and that the two of them physically checked places together and discussed where the characters would live.
Original trilogy by Stieg Larsson Having begun writing the first book in summer 2002, Larsson waited until he had finished the first two and most of the third before submitting them to Swedish publishers. Baksi suggested he might have written the first chapter in 1997, which is when Larsson told him he was writing a novel. While other publishers had turned the manuscripts down, Expos publisher Robert Aschberg recommended them to Norstedts Förlag, whose editors accepted after reading the first two books in a single sitting. Norstedts commissioned Steven T. Murray to undertake the English translation.Acocella, Joan. "Man of Mystery". New Yorker (1/10/2011), Vol. 86, Issue 43. Larsson tried to get British publishers to accept his book, but was turned down until Christopher MacLehose bought the global English-language rights of the book for his MacLehose Press, an imprint of the London publisher Quercus. Both Gabrielsson and Murray have said that MacLehose "needlessly prettified" the English translation, this being the reason Murray requested he be credited under the pseudonym "Reg Keeland." MacLehose explained that the translations were commissioned by the Swedish company who adapted the books to film in order to aid an English-speaking screenwriter whom the producers were hoping to hire. For that reason they were done quickly and were not intended for publication. MacLehose said he polished and tightened them up a bit, as he would with any translation. The English releases changed the titles, even though Larsson specifically refused to allow the Swedish publisher to change the name of the first novel, and the size of Salander's dragon tattoo; from a large piece covering her entire back, to a small shoulder tattoo. Alfred A. Knopf bought the U.S. rights to the books after Larsson's death in 2004, and uses this same translation.
Follow-up trilogy by David Lagercrantz
In December 2013, the Swedish publisher Norstedts announced that a fourth Millennium book, to be published in August 2015, would be written by David Lagercrantz, a Swedish author known for being Zlatan Ibrahimović's biographer. Gabrielsson has voiced criticism against this project, which has not made use of the unpublished material which is still in her possession. The Swedish title of the book is Det som inte dödar oss, literally translated "What Doesn't Kill Us". Like the previous novels, the English language translation was published by Quercus. The book was released with the English language title The Girl in the Spider's Web in the UK on 27 August and in the US on 1 September 2015.
The fifth book in the Millennium series was released in September 2017, once again written by Lagercrantz. The Swedish title is Mannen som sökte sin skugga (literal English translation: The Man Who Sought His Shadow) and the English title is The Girl Who Takes an Eye for an Eye. In 2017, Lagercrantz stated that he would only write one more installment in the Millennium series. Lagercrantz's The Girl Who Lived Twice was released on August 22, 2019.
Third trilogy by Karin Smirnoff In November 2021, publishing house Polaris announced that they acquired the rights to the Millennium series from Larsson's estate and will release three new books in the series. Swedish author Karin Smirnoff was confirmed as the writer in December. Smirnoff said she accepted the offer without hesitation and stated "The Millennium books are classics in their genre, where the combination of unforgettable characters and the strong political and societal engagement still fascinates readers. I will continue to build on Stieg Larsson's core themes, such as violence, abuse of power, and contemporary political currents."
Smirnoff's first entry in the series, Havsörnens skrik (literal English translation 'The Sea Eagle's Cry'''), was published on October 31, 2022. An English translation by Sarah Death titled The Girl in the Eagle's Talons was published on August 29, 2023.
Smirnoff's second book, Lokattens klor (literal English translation 'The Cat's Claws'), was published on September 29, 2024. An English translation titled The Girl with Ice in her Veins was published on September 2, 2025.
Smirnoff will write at least one more book for the series, with the title and release to be determined.
Novels
Written by Stieg Larsson Novels by Stieg Larsson English title(original Swedish title) Publication year Description The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (Män som hatar kvinnor, "Men Who Hate Women") 2005Journalist Mikael Blomkvist has been convicted of libelling billionaire industrialist Hans-Erik Wennerström and wants to escape the media attention. He is hired by industrial tycoon Henrik Vanger under the guise of writing a biography of Henrik and the Vanger family, while really investigating the 40-year-old disappearance of Henrik's niece Harriet. He teams up with the introverted and skilled computer hacker Lisbeth Salander. The Girl Who Played with Fire (Flickan som lekte med elden, "The Girl Who Played with Fire") 2006Mikael Blomkvist is contacted by freelance journalist Dag Svensson with regard to having ''Millennium'' publish his exposé on the sex trade in Sweden, which includes implicating government officials. Svensson and his girlfriend are murdered and the police believe Lisbeth Salander is the culprit. Blomkvist works to prove Salander's innocence while also trying to finish Svensson's piece and finds that both are connected. The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets' Nest (Luftslottet som sprängdes, "The Castle in the Air That Was Blown Up")2007Having learned of a secret group within the Swedish Security Service that has committed several constitutional violations against Lisbeth Salander, Mikael Blomkvist and a group of policemen from Swedish Security Service's Constitutional Protection division try to learn who its members are and have Salander cleared of the murder charges against her.
Written by David Lagercrantz