91. Read and Review 100 Books (19/100) The Girl Who Played With Fire - Stieg Larsson

'Part blistering espionage thriller, part riveting police procedural, and part piercing expose on social injustice, The Girl Who Played with Fire is a masterful, endlessly satisfying novel.


Mikael Blomkvist, crusading publisher of the magazine Millennium, has decided to run a story that will expose an extensive sex trafficking operation. On the eve of its publication, two people are brutally murdered, and the fingerprints found on the murder weapon belong to his friend, the troubled genius hacker Lisbeth Salander. Blomkvist, convinced of Salander's innocence, plunges into an investigation. Meanwhile, Salander herself is drawn into a murderous game of cat and mouse, which forces her to face her dark past.'


What a great sequel! The novel picks up pretty much straight after the events of the first novel, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo and immediately throws you on a roller-coaster ride. It provides a good deal of insight into why Lisbeth Salander is the way she is, and helps to explain her past while she's dealing with the accusations of being a murderer... I couldn't put this book down!!

86. Send a birthday card snail mail to every member of my immediate family for a year (7/11)

I spied this card a number of months ago at Hallmark and immediately thought of my crazy, wacky and zany sister-in-law Belinda... you see Bel is anything but boring or usual... she's a little loopy (in a good way) and has an awesome sense of humour... oh and she absolutely adores puppies... therefore this seemed like the most perfectly fantastic card for her birthday... did I mention the old duck is also turning 30 this years!!! When oh when did we get so old (thank goodness I have 18 months until the big 3-0 calls my name) ?!?! Happy Birthday Smelly Belly Welly... hope you have a fantastic birthday, a milestone, and your first as a mommy... I hope the hubby spoils you rotten on your big day and ensures you don't have to change a dirty diaper the whole entire day!!! 

43. Learn how to cook 5 authentic Thai dishes (1/5) Pat Thai

Ever since my first ever trip to Thailand at 18, I've wanted to learn how to cook the deliciously tasty cuisine of the land of smiles at home in my own kitchen - but now that I live in Houston, it seems unlikely that I'll be able to plan a week long cooking class tour of Bangkok and so I've resorted to the next best thing - one of the most authentic cookbooks on the market, David Thompson's Thai Food. So off we trudged to the local Asian Grocer in Houston to find the ingredients needed to turn our kitchen into a little street vendor on Sukhumvit Road.

Ingredients

A good handful of dried thin rice noodles

1 tablespoon palm sugar

1 tablespoon white sugar

1 tablespoon tamarind water

2 tablespoons fish sauce

1 small bunch Chinese chives

1 teaspoon oil

2 red shallots, coarsely chopped

1 egg

50g firm bean curd, chopped and deep fried

6 prawns

1 teaspoon salted white radish

pinch roasted chilli powder

handful bean sprouts

1 tablespoon crushed roasted peanuts

1 lime wedge

Directions

Soak noodles in water for at least 2 hours, until soft. Drain. Simmer palm sugar and white sugar with tamarind water and fish sauce for 1-2 minutes, until dissolved. Chop most of the Chinese chives into 2cm lengths, reserving a few - chopped into 5 cm lengths - for garnish.

Heat oil in a wok over a medium heat and fry shallots until fragrant and beginning to colour. Crack in one egg, turn down the heat and stir. Mix in bean curd, prawns and white radish, the add noodles. Turn up the heat and stir fry for about a minute, allowing the noodles to colour a little. Add the prepared sauce and the pinch of chilli powder, then simmer for another minute, adding a little more oil if necessary.

Finally add most of the bean sprouts and Chinese chives, cook for another 30 seconds, until wilted. Check seasoning: the noodles should taste sweet, sour and salty.

Pile on a plate and top with the reserved bean sprouts and Chinese chives. Serve with crushed roasted peanuts, a lime wedge and roasted chilli powder on the side of the plate.

It was pretty darn delicious, and the closest I've ever come to cooking authentic Thai at home.. but I must admit nothing beats the real deal on the humid and hot streets of Bangkok.. but until I'm lucky enough to find myself back there again, this'll do!! 

91. Read and Review 100 Books (18/100) The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo - Stieg Larsson

'Harriet Vanger, a scion of one of Sweden's wealthiest families disappeared over forty years ago. All these years later, her aged uncle continues to seek the truth. he hires Mikael Blomkvisk, a crusading journalist recently trapped by a libel conviction, to investigate. He is aided by the pierced and tattooed punk prodigy Lisbeth Salander. Together they tap into a vein of iniquity and corruption.'

Slightly disturbing, extremely enthralling, I really did not want to put this book down.. its a bloodthirsty page turner that makes you think and keeps you on the edge until the very last chapter.. twisting this way and that. This book had me so hooked that I seriously found myself on Amazon purchasing the next in the trilogy, The Girl Who Played With Fire, before I'd even gotten half hay through this instalment. I'm not sure what took me so long to finally pick this book up off my bookshelf and give it a go but I'm very glad I did.. looking forward to the next twisted tale.