2014 Reading: Red Dragon

I was amazed by how much the movie followed the book. AMAZED!

It's refreshing actually, to find when that happens because it is so rare. I mean, yeah, you have to take certain things into perspective because not everything can be translated from page to screen, but they actually did a very awesome job with it. So, bravo movie makers!

I've had all four of the Hannibal books for quite some time now and I am just now getting to them. I needed something to read while I was waiting for the third installment of the Maze Runner books so this seemed like a good time to break out the Thomas Harris. (BTW, I ended up buying the Maze Runner books because I was becoming too impatient waiting for it to become available at the library so I'll be getting to the last one next anyway. Oh well.)

I kept a lot of things in mind while I was reading Red Dragon. I tried to remember what I could of the movie, plus all the other movies in the series (I haven't seen Manhunter, though, because I heard it was a giant pile of crap, but whatever). I also have been watching the TV show that they made with the characters from Red Dragon and I tried to keep that in mind as well. I much prefer picturing Hugh Dancy as Will as opposed to Edward Norton (no offense to Ed, but Hugh played the part with more pain and sadness, which I think was more akin to the feelings in the books). But, as always, Hannibal to me will forever and always be Sir Anthony Hopkins. No doubt.

I could hear their voices in my head as I was reading. It was awesome.It's actually made me a little weary of reading the rest of the books because I know I'll be comparing them in my head and I'm afraid the rest aren't going to even COMPARE to this one on that front, but I must press on.

Going inside the mind of a serial killer, even a fictitious one, is a difficult thing to do, but Harris does it so simply. Everything he wrote down is something that I can believe goes through the mind of someone who might be inclined to do something destructive like that. I really admire his writing style because it is neither complicated nor simple. It gets the point across very well, but without bogging it down with technical jargon or long, drawn out descriptions. You see from the eyes of the killer, but also from the eyes of the people witnessing the after effects of the killing.

I can't wait for the rest of them.