And so the story goes

Steve and I have often debated the worst collapse in quality among writers. In some cases, like the Magic Circle, careers are killed by the quality implosion. In others, they improbably live on. For me, one of the great disappointments was Hannibal, the follow up to the Silence of the Lambs. Not only did we get the sad tale of Hannibal's childhood but we get a bizarre change of character for Clarice.

Now we have Hannibal Rising. My suspicions are all the more dark when I see that the screenplay was written at the same time! The book will come out in Dec 06 to be followed by a Feb 07 film. So is this really a "novelization?" In case you care, the book will follow the life of Hannibal before he was arrested the first time.

The general low quality of the recent books should be contrasted to the excellent Red Dragon.