The Silence of the Lambs

The Silence of the Lambs is a novel by Thomas Harris, his second to feature sociopath psychiatrist and cannibal Dr. Hannibal Lecter. In the novel and the film based on it, Clarice Starling, a young FBI trainee, is sent to question an imprisoned sociopath/psychiatrist to get information on one of his former clients, a serial killer given the name Buffalo Bill, who is abducting women and skinning them.

Real life influences

Jame Gumb is evidently based on four real-life serial killers:

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• Ed Gein, a Wisconsin man who robbed graves and murdered women in order to flay their bodies and make outfits out of them.
• Ted Bundy, who killed dozens of women in the 1970s, often luring victims by pretending he was injured with a cast on his arm, a technique Gumb used to lure Catherine Martin into his van. Similar to Lecter, Bundy also offered to help investigators find other serial murderers by "giving insights" into their psychology while he was in death row, specifically about the Green River Killer.
• Ed Kemper, who killed his grandparents when he was an adolescent, just like Gumb.
• Gary Heidnik, who held women captive in a deep hole in his basement.