Who doesn't love E.T. and Steig Larsson?

How great is this for a desk lamp? Who wouldn't feel ready to work with E.T. hawking you down?

I just finished Fragile Eternity by Melissa Marr. Seriously, what is it with all of us adults getting sucked into all of these YA books? And series no less? I have compulsive love/hate relationship with series. On one hand, I love to read about the same characters in different situations, much like watching a TV series, but I HATE to have to wait to read the next book! HATE IT! Even though I may get to read some of them early, it still means that I have to wait eventually. But if I were only to read series that were complete, I would be missing out on some of the best and most innovative YA (and adult) books.

Take for instance, my new favorite obsession, Steig Larsson, author of last year's Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. That was quite possibly one of the best debuts of the year and going to be difficult to top, so naturally I couldn't wait for his second, Girl Who Played With Fire (out in July from RH). I was literally incommunicado while I was reading this. I had started reading it on a flight and was PISSED when I had to stop because we were landing and I had to get off. I'm trying to find time to read this while I am at ABA's Winter Institute (anyone who has been there knows that there is virtually NO time to read unless you are playing hooky or up all night, sadly, neither of which I did) and couldn't stop trying to figure it out. When I finally finished it, my satisfaction was RUINED by the fact that it once again ends very abruptly and nothing is really tidied up. That is where he gets you: his plots are so tricky because they are laid out so simply that it's hard to figure out early. His characters are wonderfully flawed but not so irritating that you don't care what happens to them. When this book pubs, all bets are off. It's going to do better than his first because all of the people that read that one are going to buy this one, AND lend both to their friends because they can't stop talking about it, and then this great cycle of lending and buying will ensue . . . in a perfect world. Now we have to wait until Summer 2010 to see how the cliffhanger ends. I just wish that I had the power to resurrect people because Steig Larsson was a gem to the literary community and if only the library in The Dreaming of unfinished/never written books that Neil Gaiman created in his Sandman series existed . . .