What do You think about Hannibal Rising (2006)?
You know that Simpsons scene where Mr. Burns has the monkeys typing in a room, playing the odds that one must eventually write the next Great American Novel? This is not it. This is the leftovers Mojo the monkey left. Hannibal Lecter is the ultimate Mary Sue, behind Wesley Crusher. This book reads like screenplay rather than a novel. I hope Thomas Harris took a glee from being forced to write his most beloved character into the ground. More than likely, he sobbed all the way to the bank. Good for you! I'm never going to get those 335 pages back.
—Heather
After finishing this final installment to the Lecter series I discovered that I did not enjoy this book as much as the first three. But it was definitely still worth the read. The first few chapters were a bit confusing with so many characters coming into play. I had to make sure that I stayed focused. Also I feel it lacked some of the mystery and intensity that the first three had. I found myself having to go back over a few pages so I could grasp the story better from the start. There were also some parts to the book that I did not think really needed to be included, it made the story feel a little draggy. I did however still love the poetic style of Thomas Harris as he is able to carry it over to this book. The characters were fabulous as they were in the first three. I just feel some areas could have been cleaned up a bit.This book really allows you to discover Lecter's very tragic life. Harris really lets the readers crawl inside Lecter's mind and experience his life as a child and what he witnessed and went through as well. We are allowed to watch him grow into adulthood and how he handles situations. You also get to see exactly how smart Lecter is even at a young age.He had to face many many trials in his life such as the loss of his family and friends. I suppose I can understand why he was the way he was after reading this. As Popil said, Lecter, the child, died in 1945. And we all learn who this 'new' Lecter is. I have come to discover that Lecter really just wanted some justice, and he was the only one to see to it.
—Janie Johnson
This book is so fucking abysmal that I can’t finish it. It’s a very rare thing for me not to get through a book even if it’s a struggle. I’ll torture myself to get to the end because I get this feeling like I’m cheating myself and the author if I don’t. If someone else gets through the 323 pages of wasted paper god bless you. Every word reads like an exercise in how to bilk the public out of a couple of more dollars with a character that accidentally became famous. Hannibal Lechter is one of the great evil characters of modern American writing and cinema and the book “Hannibal Rising” does it’s very best to destroy all of his appeal. The whole draw of Hannibal Lechter is that he exudes menace and villainy while still showing a wholly respectable exterior. The vile behavior bubbling underneath only peeks out and seemingly has no basis for its existence. Lechter seems to be evil for no other reason then that he is. In “Hannibal Rising”, Thomas Harris gives us some reasoning for his malevolence. Hannibal goes mad because he is forced to watch some bad guys eat his little sister while trapped and starving in a cabin during the winter after the Nazis slaughter the rest of his family. So instead of being the ultimate bad guy himself, Harris makes Lechter someone to sort of sympathize with. Thus ruining one of the great evils of the last 20 years or so.Despite the total absurdity of the story itself you would be able to forgive Harris the mistake of writing this book. After all, it is a character he created and perhaps he felt like there was more to the story that he needed to tell. Unfortunately it doesn’t read that way at all. It reads like the novel was written to be a screenplay from the minute he put pen to page (or finger to keyboard as it more likely was). The dialogue is brittle and unimpressive and the description and narrative are sorely lacking. It’s all like it was written with the intention to touch it up later. Every word that passed by my eyes made it seem more and more like there’s no other interest here then in stealing my money. I’m going to do my best to forget that both the book and the movie “Hannibal Rising” ever existed so I can go back to loving Hannibal Lechter.
—Mike
