We've been lucky enough to receive the outline opening pages of the fourth instalment of the Millennium series. These are the books about Lisbeth Salander, the Girl with the Dragon Tatto who Played with Fire and Kicked the Hornet's Nest.
The pages from the fourth book are only a little of the remaining book, released by the author's estate, and the excitement of the first three books might be waning as he's decided to write this as a stage play by the look of it.
We know this because handwritten next to the opening paragraph is a note to say that the characters of Holger Palmgren (Lisbeth's guardian), Dr Peter Teleborian (her psychiatrist) and Lisbeth Salander are to be played by David Cameron, Gordon Brown and Northern Rock respectively. ...
Palmgren woke with a sore head that morning as Lisbeth had reported that she was feeling better. He knew that she was a dangerous girl, but he saw both sides of her: the good and the bad.
It was strange however that the bad side was good whilst the good side was bad, and it was this that caused him to have a sore head.
The girl was an enigma.
How could she be good and bad, bad and good, all at the same time?
He looked at her file.
The file was marked “Top Secret” and had been written by her psychiatrist, Dr Peter Teleborian, who had to take her under his control when she made such a mess of things.
This was three years ago, when she had blown a fortune and almost killed herself in the process.
This was when she discovered all her money had gone, as her secret accounts were perilously intertwined with the health of the complex sequence of banks around the world where she had placed her fortune.
When they imploded, she lost everything.
It wasn’t his problem that she was now poor, but he did wonder about the psychological profile of Salander, when she could recklessly give money away so needlessly and leave herself not just with nothing, but billions of kronas in debt.
He can still remember the day it happened, when she almost died after suddenly telling her guardian that she had blown her own fortune and much of the government’s too, all on investments that appeared to be worthless.
How had she managed this?
Well she thought she was some sort of Robin Hood, taking monies from the rich banks of the world and giving it away to her poor friends in the ghettos.
Not only that but Salander, as he now knew, was an expert hacker. She could break into any security system in the world and that was the secret to her wrecking the financial systems of the country.
She had tapped into the government, and taken almost 300 billion krona (about $40 billion) from the government’s own coffers.
And that was just the tip of the iceberg.
Upon finding this out and after her near death experience, she was locked in a secure centre for the financially unstable and placed under the therapy of Dr Peter Teleborian.
What Palmgren didn't know however, was that she had been tied to a soft mattress of money during the years in the centre, and just left to stare into space for days on end.
She did not like it, as it seemed like torture to be in such isolation from the world, but she was forced to tow the line because she had messed up so badly.
She had little to do with him until now but, as her new guardian, Palmgren now felt it was his job to rehabilitate Salander and get her back into society.
And that job started today, as he discovered that her bad side was quite good and her good side was quite bad.
How was he going to deal with this ... that was the question?
After three years of rehabilitation, isolation and treatment, could she be released?
He felt that now was not the time, but he would continue to watch her carefully and knew that he would be able to deal with her soon, and get the parole board to consider her release.
In the meantime, he had to sort out several other messes caused by Lisbeth's mess of finance.
All those doctors for the past three years had made them basket cases, just like Lisbeth.
Now he was going to get her back.
Obviously, the author was impacted by things happening in the real world, and we’re not sure how much more of the story played out.
We'll see if we can find some more of the manuscript, and will report back as and when.
Chris M Skinner
Chris Skinner is best known as an independent commentator on the financial markets through his blog, TheFinanser.com, as author of the bestselling book Digital Bank, and Chair of the European networking forum the Financial Services Club. He has been voted one of the most influential people in banking by The Financial Brand (as well as one of the best blogs), a FinTech Titan (Next Bank), one of the Fintech Leaders you need to follow (City AM, Deluxe and Jax Finance), as well as one of the Top 40 most influential people in financial technology by the Wall Street Journal's Financial News. To learn more click here...
