Michael Crichton, Science Fiction Master

Michael Crichton’s novels are fast-paced runs filled with science and technology. Despite writing some long books, he never loses the reader’s interest. Quick dialogues between characters often explain technical concepts that might otherwise bore readers.

Jurassic Park (1990), about a dinosaur theme park gone awry, featured a philosophical moment from Dr. Ian Malcolm: “I’ll tell you the problem with the scientific power you’re using here: it didn’t require any discipline to attain it.” Malcolm is a mathematician and Chaos Theory expert. He explains that evolution prohibits control of the reptiles and that reviving them through a genetics technique was a bad idea. The lawyer in the story is ready to make a mint but when the creatures run wild, everyone on the theme park island faces death. One of the dinosaurs eats the lawyer, not a surprise given Crichton’s background in medicine. He must have particularly enjoyed writing that passage.

Jurassic Park is a blast. Read it.

In Congo (1980), another New York Times Bestseller, an expedition ventures into the African jungle. Crichton immediately puts the reader into the predator’s element: “Dawn came to the Congo rain forest. The pale sun burned away the morning chill and the clinging damp mist, revealing a gigantic silent world.” The novel features a surprise ending with a high-tech twist. Computer professionals will like it.

The Andromeda Strain (1969) brought Crichton early fame. He wrote it while still in medical school. A deadly microbe invades Earth on a returning spacecraft and causes havoc, killing people en masse. The novel was written the same year as the first American moon landing, so it qualified the spirit of the times. Entertaining, it also voiced a legitimate concern and sounded a warning based on Murphy’s Law: What can go wrong will.

Crichton’s science fiction novels are treasure. An extraordinary talent, he passed away on November 4, 2008, but his novels still inspire.


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