Rating: 
Summary: Yikes.
Review: This is great to read-- if you have no desire to sleep ever again after reading it. By taking the reader inside the mind of his serial killer, Harris made me feel a little too much like the tortured Will Graham; you know more than you want to know, and you find yourself almost understanding why the killer acts as he does. To me, that's the scariest part of this book, and it's something which both film versions of the novel neglect. The chapters on Francis Dolarhyde's childhood are truly nightmarish. I will never look at dentures in the same way again!
Rating:
Summary: The creation of a mass murderer
Review: RED DRAGON by Thomas HarrisHere's the novel that introduced to the world the character of Hannibal Lecter, the highly intelligent, evil, witty, charming man-eater that played a large part in the two follow up novels, The Silence of the Lambs and Hannibal. However, Thomas Harris' RED DRAGON was not about Dr. Hannibal Lecter. Instead, it centered round Will Graham, a man with demons of his own, and who helped put Dr. Hannibal behind bars. Will is called out of retirement by the FBI to help solve a serial murder case. Two families have been murdered, and they think that only Will has the knack to help them find the killer. Will takes the case, despite his wife and stepson's objections, and takes up temporary residence in Georgia, where the 2nd family, The Leeds', were murdered. As he does a walk through of the family's home, he slowly sees how they were killed. His highly intuitive mind is able to recreate each individual murder. The murders are gruesome, and Harris does not hold back with the descriptions of each family member found dead in the house. While the movie let the audience try to guess who the murderer was during the early parts of the film, Harris tells the reader who murdered the two families within the first 100 pages. Francis Dolarhyde is a shy man who works for a film developing company called Gateway Film Laboratory. He's got access to hundreds of home videos that come through their labs to be processed, and is then sent back to their original families. An early scene of Dolarhyde finds him watching one of these home made videos, but he has spliced it with his own videos: the murders of these same families. He watches these over and over, turned on by the gruesome scenes that show him modeling with the dead carcasses in front of the camera. As the story progresses, Will visits Hannibal Lecter, who is now doing jail-time in maximum security. With the help of Lecter's cunning mind, Will slowly finds the trail that leads him to Dolarhyde. Thomas Harris created a great monster in Hannibal Lecter but the stars of RED DRAGON are Francis Dolarhyde and Will Graham. Harris created two very developed characters, giving the reader insight to what made both men tick. A lot of flashbacks help the reader understand why Dolarhyde became the monster that he was in the present, and oddly enough, I felt a lot of pity and sympathy for this serial killer. I found that I did not like the Will Graham character that Thomas Harris created in his book, preferring the movie version better. Not that I found myself rooting for the killer, but it was an odd sensation finding myself liking a mass murderer and wishing that someone would save him. Overall, I enjoyed this fast pace murder mystery. For those of the faint-of-heart, this book is not recommended. For those who love a great gory murder book, this is for you!
Rating: 
Summary: One of the worst books I have ever read
Review: I loved Silence of the Lambs (movie) and therefore thought that I would enjoy this book. I found the characters largely uninteresting, and the plot bland. The writing itself particularly struck me as amateurish (I will admit that I read this book after reading classic literature). Overall, I was mostly disappointed because I find it hard to think about Silence of the Lambs without remembering how bad this book was.
Rating: 
Summary: Best Hannibal Lecter book
Review: To say the least-this book was probably one of the best thrillers I have read. Harris does an outstanding job in describing the scene of the murders, and it just makes you feel a chill run down your spine as you imagine the treacherous deeds that had happened right at the scene. Of all of the characters, Harris did the best job describing the murderer, Francis Dolarhyde. It was amazing how Harris wrote about Dolarhyde, because you despise him for what he did to poor innocent families, and yet feel like crying for him at the same time. Harris did a great job of choosing William Blake to base this book upon. At the time when William Blake was alive, people had the thought that some people were born evil, and some were born good. Blake had stirred controversy at the time since he said that everyone is born good, evil is created by life itself. This is a great lesson for all of us to learn and is right on with the story since Dolarhyde's childhood was not a very pleasant one. Harris has an amazing effect on how we look at things, and shows us that people do have feelings. Two thumbs up!!!
Rating:
Summary: Don't be fooled!
Review: You've already heard how great this book is from other
reviewers, I just wanted to inform potential buyers that,
despite the confusion Hollywood probably caused, Red Dragon
is in fact the *first* Hannibal Lecter book, not a prequel
written after the fact. This was written in 1981, Silence
in 1989, and Hannibal in 1998. That said, I concur that this is indeed a good book. I went
in having a very misguided idea what I was reading. I thought
I was reading a Murder Mystery and was disappointed when the
author revealed who the killer was, but in fact Red Dragon is
a psychological thriller, detailing the workings of the
criminal mind. It's not asking us "whodunnit" it's telling us
why. At times I felt like I was reading a book about myself.
Needless to say, I love this book, and am anticipating seeing
both the movies (the 1986 film Manhunter being the first movie
based on this book) that were spawned from this book. I have
not seen or read Silence of the Lambs or Hannibal, but this
book is so good that it makes me want to continue reading after
it's over.
Rating:
Summary: A great prequel to one of the most horrifing trilogies
Review: Red Dragon written by Thomas Harris is one of the most intense and suspensful books that I have ever read. This prequel is a must read for those who have read Silence of the Lambs and Hannibal. The book hooks you from the start making everything else such as sleep and eating not an option until you are finished.
Everyone knows that the when a movie is based on a book, the two are rarely identical and the book is usually better. However, Red Dragon the movie is as good as the book. It is as intense and sets the same mood as the book. Hannibal is as creepy, itelligent, and masterful as ever before. Even though I did give the book five stars there is something that the book lacked that the movie made up, the ending.
In the book when Will Grahm (the FBI agent that caught Lecter) gets a call from Jack Crawford, he is attacked by Dolarhyde the killer of the families and also known as the Red Dragon. Dolarhyde stabbed Will and goes after Molly, Will's wife. Molly and her son, William, try to escape from Dolarhyde after she hits him with a fishing rod and getting the hooks stuck in his cheek. As he's running after her the fishing line gets caught in a bush giving Molly more time to prepare to fight him. She sends her son upstairs to hide in a closet. While she's up there she grabs a gun which they keep and then goes to face Dolarhyde. As Dolarhyde barges through the door, she shoots him once in the thigh and four times in the face before she knows that he is dead. The book ends with Will in the hospital recuporating...
In the movie Will goes inside to check on their son Josh and finds that mirrors are broken. He precedes upstairs to find that his son has a knife to his throat by the hand of Dolarhyde. He makes Dolarhyde really mad and he lets the boy go in order to attack Will. Will and Josh both escape into the master bedroom and lock the door. The door has slits in it so thry can see out of it. Will sees Molly coming up the stairs and he tells her to duck, right as Dolarhyde was about to kill her...
Both the of the endings have their ups and downs but I prefered the movie because afterward it shows that Will Graham and his family are alright. It doesn't just end like the book does.
Rating:
Summary: I felt sorry for him!
Review: My favorite Thomas Harris book of the three I've read, this is the story of an FBI agent named Will Graham on the tail of a incredible serial killer. He'll pick out a family, break into their house, and shoot them all, one by one. He's very smart, leaving hardly any clues. Even the profilers don't have much on him. You also see the book from the point of view of the killer, a man named Francis Dolarhyde -- and Harris actually made me feel sorry for the man. He was born illegitimate. The harelip that mars his face that was never surgically corrected. His mother abandoned him and he was raised first in a bleak orphanage, then with various relatives who never cared for him, including a grandmother who put Norman Bates's mom to shame. Now he works for a photo lab and speaks with a lisp and is dating a beautiful blind woman named Reba. And he's trying to stop killing, because Reba doesn't deserve a boyfriend who's a murderer, now does she? This is a fine book, though the ending didn't make all that much sense. What I admire most is Thomas Harris's ability to get me to pity this terrible killer. While I loved "The Silence of the Lambs", I think "The Red Dragon" was better. Hannibal plays a minor part in this story but the real meat of the plot goes to Francis, who is as worthy of it as the doctor if not more so.
Rating:
Summary: The Best Thomas Harris book to date!
Review: Red Dragon is the first Thomas Harris book I've ever read (some 8 or so years ago- a paper back edition with a nice red cover illustrating a spiral encircled dragon-man.) Enticed to read the series after adopting "The Silence of the Lambs" as a favorite movie, I found Red Dragon to be the most thrilling book in the series. Though I found both the book and movie "Hannible" to be a bit over drawn and too deliberate to justly satiate the psycho-thriller craving inspired by Red Dragon and Silence/Lambs; the Mustang fast-back Clarice drove none the less redeemed it to a forgiveable level. I guess any author who tries to follow up two books of such mastery will be apt to over work their long in the making "master piece" in such a way that it loses the luster which made its more intuitive predecessors respectable. Still I'm looking forward to the next- hopefully a complete redeption!
Rating:
Summary: Awesome!
Review: First, i saw the movie, which i thought was good...but then i read the book! It is excellent! It goes in with more detail on "Mr. D" and Will Grahm. I would recommend this to those who liked "Silence of the Lambs"
Rating:
Summary: Almost as good as the film
Review: Unlike most people, I read Red Dragon AFTER seeing the movie, and unlike most people, I think the film is better. The book is, however, a terrifying trip into the mind of an insane killer and an exciting read. The main character is ex-FBI agent Will Graham, the man who caught Hannibal the Cannibal. He was seriously hurt in their last encounter, and quit the Bureau; now his old boss has asked him to come back to help on a new case. Will visits his old nemesis, Hannibal Lecter, in prison and picks his brain for clues to the identity of the current killer, called the Tooth Fairy, who has murdered two families. Lecter is as sly as always, however, and Will must do most of the work himself. The author has created a hideous demon in his Tooth Fairy, and gives us a complete background story that explains his mental state. The story moves so quickly between pitiful flashbacks, gory crime scenes, and the forensic process, you'll be breathless, afraid to go on, and desperate to see what happens next. At times, the story is told in the words and thoughts of the crazed villian, and they are believable and truly frightening. A few minor changes, like making Lecter's part bigger, made the film even more intense, but the novel is still extremely well-written and guarranteed to send you checking the locks on your doors and windows! If you like scary crime novels, you'll love Red Dragon.
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