Opinions about Franco in Spain are pretty divided. Interestingly, many towns in Spain still have streets and monuments bearing Franco's name, even though that is getting less and less. Franco's burial place (Valle de los Caidos, Valley of the fallen), a massive, pompous temple, built into a mountainside near Madrid with a giant cross on top of it, is still there and visited by tourists and Franco supporters alike (the place was built with Republican slave labor). Most moderate Spaniards accept that Franco had some "good" points as well: the way that he stayed clear of any major involvement in WW2 is often cited, initially pro-Hitler (more out of opportunism than ideology), when it was clear Germany was losing, he pulled back the Spanish "Blue Division" and steered a more pro-Allied course. He undoubtedly initiated a period of repression in Spain, esp. of the Basques and Catalans, and anybody with any leftist views, although things started somewhat to relax in the sixties, Franco was getting more and more senile by then. I think most people also realize that if a leftist (possibly a communist govt) would have emerged after the civil war a similar period of repression would have begun, only with different victims. After all, during the civil war, both sides, not just Franco's, committed the most terrible atrocities.
A good, introductory book about Spain is "The Story of Spain" by Mark Williams. Highly recommended.
