The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Vol. 1, adapted by Denise Mina

Title: The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Vol. 1
Author: Denise Mina (adaptation)
Publication Date: November 13, 2012
Length: 146 pages

Note: I'm reviewing this as an adaptation of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, so I'm assuming some familiarity with the plot of the novel.

This is the first of what will be a six-volume graphic novel adaptation of Stieg Larsson's Millenium Trilogy. It basically covers the part of the first book before Mikael and Lisbeth cross paths.

The one issue I had with this graphic novel is that a few too many liberties were taken with the plot for my liking. For example, in the novel, Lisbeth gets a new guardian because Palmgren had a stroke. In this book, Palmgren is shown talking to Lisbeth about her new guardian, seemingly perfectly fine. But if he was fine, why would she get a new guardian? Also, at times the characters seem like exaggerated versions of themselves, presumably because several hundred pages of narration is being crammed into a short graphic novel.

I did really like the "feel" of this book. It felt like Stieg Larsson's work. So it was true to it in that way. In particular, I really liked the art (by Leonardo Manco and Andrea Mutti). It was always clear who was who, which is my basic standard by which I judge comic book art (because so much of it fails at this).

4 stars. Because even though there were problems with it that I'm thinking of as I review it, while reading it I did have a good time.