Rating: 
Summary: wait for the movie. better- don't bother with that, either.
Review: just me, or was this written like a screenplay, with scenes blocked out and camera directions. i guess Harris saw as a forgone conclusion that this latest book would be turned into a movie. what a sellout...
Rating: 
Summary: Not what I expected
Review: I anxiously awaited Hannibal. I was completely drwn into the dynamic between Lector and Starling in Silence of the Lambs and my return to Harris' work was yearning for moreof it. What I found instead was a story that stretched one's imagination to a breaking point. I find it unsettling that the relationship between Starling and Lector turned into such a disturbing fettish. That goes upstream against anything and everything we learned about her in the Silence. Perhaps if Starling's character played more than an afterthought role in the book, it could have developed into a beleivable scenerio. As it is, the relationship is simply false. I found Hannibal a dissapointing and goulish read.
Rating:
Summary: A Patchwork Plot Goes for the Grossout
Review: The story itself felt like a poorly-stitched quilt. Every story segment seemed to be a setup for a set piece grossout scene. This was a story virtually devoid of the psychological tension done so well in Silence of the Lambs, that went, unerringly, for the easiest of targets: the Grossout, as Stephen King calls it. Starling has turned out to be a big, whining crybaby, and the outcome of her and Lector's relationship has got to be the hands-down award winner for Biggest Waste of Good Characters. I finished it because I always like to finish what I started, unlike Harris. I have no way of knowing, but this book felt to me like someone with a bad case of writer's block just blowing out words onto the page and then selling them for zillions of dollars. If I were you, I'd avoid this book.
Rating: 
Summary: Not bad, just different
Review: I really really enjoyed the first two. But this one hannibal is free and able to do what he wants, not what Starling wants. So hannibal drives throughout this one. Dark and morbid, and still suspenseful. Good read. Just not his best.
Rating:
Summary: Jodi was right
Review: Upon hearing Jodi Foster wanted nothing to do with the next Hannibal movie, I was initally disappointed. Then I read the book. Where is the Harris who thrilled me through Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs? After shooting this dog full of holes, I am afraid to re-read those classics, fearing I might find fault with them. Have I become more sophisticated, or has Harris sold out? I fear the latter. The premise was unconvincing and contrived. I specifically requested this book as a gift and would like to publicly ask her forgiveness for money wasted!
Rating:
Summary: Unbelievable
Review: I couldn't believe this book. It was so fascinating until the last few chapters. I couldn't put it down, it was so interesting and pretty quickly-paced, too. But then ending was utterly preposterous, and replete with atrocities that were neither scary nor humorous, even in the black-comedy fashion they were meant to be. It was just too twisted and sick to be frightening OR funny. The ending ruined the entire novel, which I had been really enjoying up until that point. Explaining why the character of Lecter was the way he was, interested me, but then to push it SO far over the top and change Starling's character completely, was the author's disastrous mistake, in my opinion. I would have given it five stars but the ending brings it down to 3. Kind of sad and a major disappointment.
Rating:
Summary: Disappointing....Painful Even...Don't Bother.
Review: This book was a big disappointment to me. I usually have a high tolerance for bad writing and giant plot gaps in thrillers. They're beach reads - I'm not expecting Hemmingway. However, this book really pushed the limits of my tolerance. I've enjoyed some of the author's other books, so I expected it to be a fast-paced, nice escape from the daily grind. Instead, I got a painfully slow, unbearably boring tome. Part of the problem is that these characters are familiar to you from his other book (not to mention a good movie adaptation). What they do in this story is not credible - or interesting. Don't buy it just because you liked the first one...better off finding something else.
Rating:
Summary: Hannibal
Review: What a disappointment! It lacks any of the intense physiological horror we had anticipated. Maybe we'd been spoiled by Silence of the Lambs, but this sequal is slow,tedious, far-fetched and seems its only connection to its predecessor is the character's names! Too bad, it had such potential.If it was just any horror book I'd give it a "C", but as the sequal to a master...don't bother!
Rating:
Summary: For those who think we're getting more perverse¿
Review: ...consider that Harris puts the eponymous Dr. Lecter into an historic perspective [that of Renaissance Firenze] which he does quite well. He also has clearly studied philosophy and psychology, which might surprise even his fans, as his deceptively simple style seems, well, unsophisticated until you try to write that way yourself and realise it's quite hard. However, I must agree in the final analysis with the majority who find the seduction of Starling to be incomprehensible. I'd have found it easier to believe if he had killed her, or vice versa. I might have ruined the ending for the reader, had other reviewers not done likewise. In any case, the portrayal of evil not merely in history but in the US government bureaucracy [which is where I daresay most of us have seen it first-hand] is an achievement that a not-quite-believable ending does not quite erase.
Rating: 
Summary: Entertaining, but dull in comparison
Review: Standing alone, Hannibal is an entertaining read. However, when compared along side classics such as Red Dragon and The Silence of the Lambs, it leaves a little to be desired. Harris weaves an interesting, if slightly unbelievable, story, and the reader is able to easily follow along as the inner cogs of the storyline mesh seemlessly together. While Harris's storytelling ability, and astounding use of the vernacular, acts as the main strenght of this work, he limits the character development which have grown throughout the previous two novels. Ultimately, the departure from main characters' expected behavior results in a disappointing end to the trilogy. This novel will be most successful for those reading it independently of the first two works.
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