"The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo": casting the new film version

"The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" is pretty much inescapable this summer. Either you've read the book or you've seen the Swedish-language film version or both. Or, if you're one of the few who've somehow missed the juggernaut, please note that there will be another incarnation of the story coming at you soon. Sony is now casting the English-language version of the global bestseller by deceased Swedish journalist Stieg Larsson.

Daniel Craig – aka, cinema's most recent James Bond – has closed a deal to play journalist Mikael Blomkvist, the male protagonist of "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo," says Deadline.com.

That's big news for the many fans of the Millennium Trilogy (the series also includes "The Girl Who Played with Fire" and "The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest.") In a way, however, the question of who will play Blomkvist is a less urgent matter. Much more important is the film identity of quirky heroine Lisbeth Salander.

Deadline.com has already reported that possibilities include Ellen Page, Mia Wasikowska, Emily Browning, Sara Snook, Rooney Mara, and Sophie Lowe. The movie is scheduled for release on Dec. 21, 2011.

Meanwhile, even as fans focus on the movie versions of "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo," the books have gone on to make other kinds of headlines. Amazon has announced that Larsson (who died in 2004) has become the first author to sell more than 1 million digital versions of his work for Amazon's Kindle e-reader. This makes Larsson the first member of the new "Kindle Million Club."

All three books in Larsson's Millennium Trilogy, says Amazon, are now in the Top 10 bestselling Kindle books of all time.

Marjorie Kehe is the Monitor's book editor.

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