Rating: 
Summary: Beyond Disturbing, but it does what it's supposed to.
Review: I was both repulsed and horrified by this book. Harris manages to completely destroy the only sympathetic character, which of course was Starling, and by the finale all we are left with is monsters. I have read it once, I am not glad to have read it, and I never intend to read it again. But despite- no, because of all that, the author did what he had intended, to examine the minds of killers and set the moralities we cherish on their ears. Hannibal is not a comfortable read, and I would not reccomend it to anyone with a weak stomach, but in its own way, it is a work of art.
Rating: 
Summary: High Expectations Were Not Met!
Review: I couldn't wait for this book to be published! I thoroughly enjoyed all of Thomas Harris's previous novels and I had high expectations for this one. Unfortunately, my expectations were not met. Harris could have done so much with the return of Hannibal - instead he chose to bore us with gruesome details of an implausible story line. And the ending! It was almost offensive - it's as if he took the quickest and shortest route to wrap up the story to meet a deadline. On a positive note, he has a way of bringing the reader into the story with his wonderful landscape descriptions and historical and cultural narratives - they are the only reasons I kept turning the page.
Rating: 
Summary: Thomas Harris' Hannibal
Review: Hannibal by Thomas Harris is set mainly in Italy and Mason Verger's home. The book is mostly about Mason Verger, who was one of Lecter's victims. He is now paralyzed yet somewhat alive, and he wants to capture Lecter to get revenge. So he hires various people to try and catch him. At the beginning of the book, Lecter is living in Italy under the alias Dr. Fell, and he flees to Canada after Verger's first attempt fails. The book constantly switches between what is happening with Hannibal Lecter and Mason Verger, with chapters about Clarice Starling in between. I enjoyed this book, but it wasn't as good as I thought it would be. It's a bit slow, unlike its prequel, The Silence of The Lambs, which I read in less than a week, while this took me about a month. The main reason it took me so long is that Harris put a lot of detail in, for instance, almost a whole chapter devoted to describing Pazzi's dead body, and full-page descriptions of buildings, streets, etc, instead of getting to exciting parts faster, as he did in Silence. There should have only been a few chapters on Italy, instead there was a whole 100 page section, in which the only part that caught my attention was the plan to get Lecter, yet once Pazzi gets into the museum where Lecter works, it's obvious that he's going to die. Something else I found annoying was that characters often spoke in Italian, and that kind of lost me as to what they were planning. Yet once you actually get what is going on, the plot is actually very creative. One of the best features of this book is that you learn more about Hannibal Lecter; his childhood and what he's thinking, so you actually end up feeling bad for him during some parts. I especially liked Thomas Harris using a "mind palace" to describe Lecter's mind. However, I think that Starling should have been included more, since she could have made the plot a lot more interesting. I didn't like the very ending, yet the parts very close to it are kind of intriguing, even while they are extremely grotesque. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone with an extremely weak stomach because some of Harris' descriptions are quite vivid.
Rating: 
Summary: What a waste of time
Review: I read Silence of the Lambs in a few days, it kept me so enthrallled. HANNIBAL took over a month to finish. I was so uninterested in it I had to force myself to finish it since I had paid for it! The last part of it was so ridiculous. If I had just waited and gotten it at the library I would have taken it back after a third of the pages.
Rating: 
Summary: A book worth savoring!
Review: I really enjoyed this book. The tone is different than its predecessors. I enjoyed thinking about what was going to happen next while I wasn't reading it. Very chilling!
Rating:
Summary: It's as good as it ever could have been
Review: Forget all the hype that surrounds this and its prequels and all the people who expected it to be the best book ever written. This is no masterpiece, but it's a great read, exciting and intelligent. The prose is wonderfully sparse and restrained. The imagery is disturbing. Sure, the ending's like nothing you could have imagined, but what else could Harris have done? Up against the likes of The Bone Collector and Every Dead Thing and even the brilliant Prayers For Rain, Hannibal reads like it is written by THE master of the genre. It's two protagonists are the best characters in contemporary serial killer crime fiction. It reminded me that everyone else writing this kind of stuff is just a pretender to the throne. I hope Mr Harris writes something else before 2005!
Rating:
Summary: Hannibal Is The Man!
Review: It didn't take me long to get pulled into the grasp of Hannibal. I enjoyed Silence Of The Lambs and thought the sequal was worth reading, and I was right on the money. Harris's research and descriptions of his characters is remarkable. The details brought forth scents and feelings of being right there alongside Hannibal. Every word, every sound, every smell was expertly described and worded to give you a taste for this brilliant novel. Any fan of Harris and Hannibal should invest in reading this book...it's a great deal at Amazon that's worth purchasing.
Rating:
Summary: HANNIBAL--A Reader's Review
Review: In flowery prose and lilting description, Thomas Harris once again draws us into the mind of the elegant monster Dr. Hannibal Lecter. Essentially, the book is less of a sequel but more of an individual novel with harrowing plot twists that render surprising results. This book tests the bounds of the believable, rising question to Mr. Harris himself who is quoted as saying, "I can't write it until I believe it." The book begins in predictable fashion, but soon picks up the pace and prepares the reader for a tour de force of astronomic proportions. For a while, at least, we get what we came for. The description in the book is beautifully representative of how Lecter sees the world, and how we see him. An interesting aspect of the book is its treatment of Lecter, which presents him as a little more human but no less terrifying. I am reminded of the Rolling Stones song, "Sympathy for the Devil": Lend Lecter a shoulder to cry on with the risk of him nibbling at your neck. The book has remarkable potential early on, taking us through the haunted halls of Lecter's mind and introducing us to his nemesis, Mason Verger. The climax of the book is a page-turning, nail-biting roller coaster. If only the end justifies the means. These climatic events lead up to an end, which is for lack of a better word, perplexing. For fans who have followed his work and have waited 10 long years for a sequel, the ending is an outrageous betrayal of the characters and a disappointment. I have always loved a surprise ending, but please...make it plausible! The strained conclusion seems silly at best, as if it were penciled in at the last minute. Only now having read the book do I understand Jodie Foster's reluctance to do the sequel. While Harris created the character of Clarice, Jodie Foster gave her life on the screen. The book essentially betrays the character of Clarice, and sallows the plucky tenacity of her personality that makes her the sympathetic heroine of "The Silence of the Lambs." While I enjoy the psychological insight into the characters, I feel the original story is somewhat marred by the sequel. HANNIBAL is a thought-provoking, beautifully descriptive book, punctuated by brief moments of genius. Its eventual downfall is its less than palatable ending, leaving the reader dismayed and vaguely unfulfilled.
Rating:
Summary: I Like It !
Review: I thought the book was great, I had a problem with the Italian, but other than that I truly enjoyed the book. He was very detailed in his writing. I truly enjoyed it.
Rating:
Summary: EWWWWW!
Review: This book got increasingly repulsive, both in terms of content and of style. Harris's skills have become a parody of themselves as he indulges in every kind of flowery speech. And there's not one likeable character here, especially poor Clarice Starling. The ending of the book is thoroughly disgusting and almost painful. Do not read this. Wait for the movie, as a lot of what happens, like the first time around, will be cut out.
|
