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A review by octavia_cade
Hannibal by Thomas Harris
dark
tense
medium-paced
4.0
I used to own a copy of this, but goodness only knows where it's gone... usually my missing books can be found at my sister's (and in all fairness, I am very late in returning some of hers!) but I don't even remember lending it out. So I had to resort to a library copy for this reread. It is, I think, my favourite of the series - there's something so horrifyingly disgusting about what happens to horrible Krendler, but it's just so well-deserved that I struggle to find even a shred of sympathy for him. And the pigs, too, are terrible. Worst of all is Mason Verger, and rarely has a villain earned an eel shoved down his throat (if only because it can't be good for the eel), but this one does.
In some ways this book takes a little of the horror away from Lecter, though. He's still terrifyingly effective, but that murderous whimsy is here almost entirely directed towards genuinely terrible people. Not just rude people, but child abusers and sexual harassers and kidnappers and crooked cops. He's turned from monster to antihero, almost, and while it's deeply entertaining to see him aimed at awful people, it does undermine that sense of universal threat somewhat.
In some ways this book takes a little of the horror away from Lecter, though. He's still terrifyingly effective, but that murderous whimsy is here almost entirely directed towards genuinely terrible people. Not just rude people, but child abusers and sexual harassers and kidnappers and crooked cops. He's turned from monster to antihero, almost, and while it's deeply entertaining to see him aimed at awful people, it does undermine that sense of universal threat somewhat.