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Prey
In some ways willing suspension of disbelief has to be applied less to the technology depicted and more to the relationships between our protagonists Jake and Julia. They're the typical Silicon Valley couple, all right, but oh how conveniently their relationship advances the plot. He's the between-jobs programming team manager who's specialized in code that models distributed processing and genetic algorithms. She's the cute PR talking head who is lining up funding for the revolutionary Xymos nanobots. He's the cool, loving house-dad that takes care of the cute kids. She's the always-working cold bitch who's having an affair -- isn't she? With the tanned surfing god Xymos exec we hiss at as soon as we meet him? Or is this whole plot line perhaps a little too obvious after being set up by page 18? Maybe Crichton has something a little more twisted in mind for the 350 pages that follow ...
Yep, he sure does, and as fast as helicopters can fly we're at the secretive Xymos desert lab in Nevada where nothing is as it seems. Those swirling little dust devils out there on the parking lot security cameras are considerably more menacing than Taz in a Loony Tunes cartoon, but damned if anybody will give Jack a straight answer about just how ... or especially why. Seems the escaped particles that make up the clouds have been programmed with distributed computing algorithms Jack came up with in his last job -- Xymos wants HIM to tell THEM what's going on. Uh, oh -- Jack used the concept of predator / prey stalking dynamics to keep distributed agents focused on a concrete goal.
Jack's subsequent experiences, experiments, thought processes, and realizations lead the reader into a fascinating exploration of the concept of hive mind. In one sense this is a book about prejudice -- people are the most evolved social mammals on Earth, and as such are always misinterpreting the capabilities, actions and behaviors of a swarm that has neither leaders or followers, only members. As such, Prey is a rare SF book that truly does explore a uniquely alien life form with some very interesting twists. It's also a thought-provoking possible example of Vernor Vinge's technological singularity concept.
It's a good book and it's going to make a great movie. If you just can't wait for the movie, though, no problem. Crichton's three-act structure for Prey follows the well-trod path of a trio of 50s-style sci-fi movie classics: Tremors , Them! , and Invasion of the Body Snatchers . Check 'em out and watch 'em in order after you read Prey for a fun follow-up. To include the tension of Jack and Julia's romantic triangle, watch Casablanca first ... and remember, a kiss is just a kiss, as time goes by.
You can purchase Prey from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
I find it invigorates the mind and expands the vocabulary. Too bad the entire fiction section at my school's library could be stacked on my monitor...
Everyone on slashdot has a journal.
And here I thought Prey had been cancelled...
All Your Memory Are Belong To Java
Please apply a s/nanotecghnology/nanotechnology/ to this review. Thank you.
Well, what do you think?
Wouldn't evolution have constructed lifeforms of this kind long ago if they were stable and competetive in a natural environment?
...to do book reviews. This is one of the best book reviews I've seen on any site for some time.
I really enjoyed THe Andromeda Strain, and thought it was superb I then read a few of his other; Congo, Terminal Man, Sphere, and couple of others whose name escape me and was not all that impressed. I have given up on him.
If anybody feels the same way I do, I can recommend this book I will then read it, else it holds no chance.
Either give it away or get top dollar, but never sell yourself cheap.
The people are writing machines. They exist in order to fill airport bookstores and CVS book racks. People like Mary Shelley, Stephen King, Dean Koontz... anyone who can churn out 30 identical books should be considered a hack. Or a very well-written bot. :)
Cretin - a powerful and flexible CD reencoder
Indeed, Spielberg did a fantastic job with Jurassic Park. But the movie based on Sphere (which in my opinion is Crichton's best book) was a disaster. Although I haven't read Prey, I bet it'll be possible to make a great movie out of it, if only given to the right producers. Slim chance. I will certainly don't take for granted that such a movie turns out good....
I suppose by that you mean that the female character arrogantly and ignorantly intiates a series of "bad things" that the male characters must overcome ?
The book might be OK. But, I don't read stuff from shark-jumping authors. However, let's all hope and pray that a movie is never made. "Congo", 'nuff said.
I hope the microbes in this book get some lawyer while he's on the can...
I don't like spoilers, but anyone read this? I must know if there's a lawyer eating involved, and if the book is worth my time.
Thank you, slashdot folks. You have always proven yourselves helpful.
/^[A-Z0-9._%+-]+@[A-Z0-9.-]+\.[A-Z]{2,4}$/i
My uncle got me one of his books when I was in middle school. I then proceeded to read everything he ever had published that I could get my hands on.
Now I don't enjoy his books at all and I find him to be sort of behind the curve (but in terms of what the general public knows, he is still ahead of the curve).
I'd much rather read Neal Stephenson in terms of books that have a technical backing to the story. And NS wrote about nano way before MC. MC is just jumping on the bandwagon - and will likely cause a "stir" with it simply because more people read his stuff.
Generally speaking, if a lot of people read and like an author, I'm finding that I don't tend to like it.
Maybe I'm just a dick, or an elitist snob. But if a book makes the NYT bestseller list, or Oprah's list, then I steer clear of it.
(that said, I did enjoy Cold Mountain)
There are some odd things afoot now, in the Villa Straylight.
I would like to see Andromeda Strain redone as another movie -- it was an excellent read and view, but I could see some major differences in how it would be adapted for today's audience. It would be great.
Click here or here.
Could someone please run demoroniser over stuff before posting it?
They?re
that?s
Crichton?s
Check ?em
watch ?em
That's what it looks like to me.
Linux is only free if your time has no value. Windows is only free if you threaten to use Linux.
I had a similar idea for a story 3 years ago. Should have copyrighted it.
Here is the correct link for the cited movie Them!
Who says they'd be stable and competitive? Nanomonsters, grey goo, and most other hypothetical boogymen are the antithesis of "stable and competitive". They only have to exist long enough to devour the entire food supply (us) before becoming extinct.
Similarly, Bengal tigers would probably not thrive if you dropped a bunch of them off in northern Vermont. But they could still do a lot of damage in the short-term.
Probably one of the most famous crimes in Britain last century was the Great Train Robbery in 1963, which formed the factual underpinning for the film and book. Most of the 15 men involved in the heist were caught; one of them, Ronnie Biggs, escaped from jail in a rather daring manner and became something of a celebrity as a result. Last year he returned from Brazil, aged 71, to give himself up. A Google for Biggs and the great train robbery should give you a wealth of information, but here's a link to get started:
p .html
http://www.canoe.ca/CNEWSScienceNews/train_may7-a
I would only say that a handful of Asimov's books are really worthy of great praise. Many of the rest, if not quite so formulaic as the Clancies and Chrichtons, are just nothing special.
Typical Crichton book: great underlying idea, 2-dimensional characters, obvious plot contrivances saved by a couple of clever twists, and chapters laid out in a way tailor made to be a blueprint for a script. It's worth a trip to the library, or buying it in paperback. Don't buy it hardcover.
Ok, so he wasn't a lawyer in that, but he still should be punished for crimes against humanity for "Mad About You". That man is more grating, obnoxious and annoying than a young Jerry Lewis.
i disagree! i read PREY, and it sucked.
(i kinda liked CONGO, book and movie.)
the description of computer programs etc. are classic -- clasically BAD -- crichton.....
as for quality sci-fi:
go read SOLARIS or THE INVINCIBLE instead.
hell, rent WESTWORLD instead!
(or THE TERMINATOR -- ever notice some interesting similarities there BTW?)
blegh
It's been a few months since I finished Timeline and I'm in some serious Michael Crichton Voodoo-Science(tm) withdrawl.
Just one question, though...
If we can't figure out time travel, and we're relying on quantum theory in such a way that when we try to send someone through time the person who arrives was actually sent from a parallel reality where they do understand time travel and not actually the person we sent...why do transcription errors happen? Can't we just rely on a parallel reality where they don't have transcription errors?
>She's the always-working cold bitch
That sums up pretty much every female in every one of his books. Crichton is like Lucas, he has some great ideas, interesting twists, and generally strong plots. His character development, particularly of women, barely qualifies as one dimensional. His dialogue is laughable at best. He should come up with the ideas and let other people who can actually write do the writing part.
this is getting old and so are you
blog
"It's a good book and it's going to make a great movie."
So 'in some ways' this is just a glorified, expanded screenplay? A good book but a great movie? ALL of Crichton's books are like that! 'In a sense'.
(Well maybe not Congo... certainly not Congo... Tim Curry running around blathering on about "Zinge" (or whatever) still makes me cringe))
cheers
front
Man challenges nature... Man appears to be successful in challenging nature... Nature awakens and bites man in the ass!
Makes for good books though doesn't it? Jurassic Park, Congo...others.
That's my only problem with Crichton. It seems every book of his -- from Andromeda to Sphere to Jurassic Park -- suffers from the same abrupt ending.
I respect that the stories do end and that it's over -- but you have to look at it from a story arc. You can run the arc a number of ways, but essentially in a mystery/suspense you've got this curve that's going up and up and up, and then has a climax or two, then comes down.
I always got the feeling from his books of the curve going up, up, up, and then... flatline. No climax, just like "Oh, 300 pages, time's up." Sort of thing.
I thought it might just have been my problem with one or two of his stories, but after reading a few of them I started to feel it something more like the "Crichton Climax"(tm), (or anti-climax, if you will).
sorry, couldn't resist...
BTW, what psychological problem makes someone choose a self-deprecating nick?
ok, only kidding...
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
JP was his greatest book, IMHO. If they had filmed the movie exactly like the book, you would have shit your pants in the theatre!
(And the movie would have been 5 hours long.)
I've read all his books, and to me, JP stands out by far. Those others you listed (Congo, Terminal Man, Sphere) had interesting ideas, but were not his best work. I believe if you liked Andromeda Strain, you will like this book. I bought it as a present for my brother, and started reading the opening pages... next thing I knew, page 100. Whoops.
"And like that
I love Mr. Chrichton's novels because they're original. Not this time. Prey is a mixture of past themes: dangerous organisms at a research lab in the desert and an isolated group of people being stalked by dangerous predators. Plus a "Sixth Sense" style plot twist.
I would recommend Andromeda Strain, Eaters of the Dead, Congo, Rising Sun and Disclosure instead.
"Crichton stretches out another nano-idea" brightened my morning the other day.
Sphere may be the worst book I've ever (tried) to read, but it made a reasonable (rental) movie.
## W.Finlay McWalter ## http://www.mcwalter.org ##
I thought it was a good book. It's not a classic, but it's not The Lost World. And it probably won't make as terrible a movie as Congo. It was a nice break from more plot heavy books: kind of techno-mindlessness and a leads to b leads to c.
Like I said, though, it just kind of came to a rather disorganized end. I'm ok with stories that don't wrap everything up, but this one just kind of petered out.
-h-
I've always thought that there are two very distinct skill involved in writing. The first is storytelling, the ability to weave a yarn that is enthralling, touching, satisfying, etc. The second is skill with the language, the ability to create a rich imaginary world, enticing to all the senses, with only the written word.
There are some writers who clearly excel at both. The first that comes to mind is Pat Conroy.
Crichton (note the correct spelling, which is used selectively in the original post) falls into a category of writers with superb storytelling skills but merely competent language skill. Also in this category is Grisham. I suspect it may even have aided them in their success; in a country where supposedly the average adult reads at a fifth grade level maybe dumbing down the language is what's needed for mass market appeal.
That said, I like Crichton's past books. Sometimes it's fun to be able to zip through a book without taxing the language processing lobes of the brain much or thinking about how the story was delivered to you. But oftentimes I leave his work feeling that the story was shovelled at me with no finesse, or style, or creativity.
Light cup, beer drink, thin so chain, neck turtle fat, man I won't say it again
Jurassic Park, on the other hand, was interesting and fun, and I recommend anyone who hasn't to read it to do so.
But for the most part, Chriton is sort of a "let down".
He has potential though, so it's worth reading reviews to see if something of his could be worth reading.
Cheers.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
For a hellish vision of Mars, look no further than Mission to Mars. I could not sleep for days after seeing that. I mean, come on, crying aliens!?!?
>I'd much rather read Neal Stephenson in terms of books that have a technical backing to the story.
I've always hated his books because to me they had no realistic technical backing and it appeared that he was trying to cover up by making things obscure/hazy/long winded. Techinical fantasy, sure.
But for realistic techinical I rather read Robert J. Sawyer.
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
Examples:
-- ac at work
Having read the book, I can say that Crichton is just churning out yet another book in his series of pulp semi-sci-fi novels. His writing style is simplistic and requires little intelligence or thought; very few (if any) questions are asked of the reader. And all his books carry the same theme: do we take our ideas of technology too far without thinking? Crichton always says that we do, but somehow we muddle through anyway. Doesn't that imply that we really should just keep doing what we're doing?
If you actually like to have a challenging text and interesting things to think about, check out Neal Stephenson's Cryptonomicon and Snow Crash.
I bought this book for my father for Christmas, and while waiting to be picked up from the mall, decided to sneak a peek at the first 20 pages or so. Unfortunately, I have this annoying habit of being unable to leave a book unfinished, so I plowed through the remainder of the book that night.
This post will contain minor spoilers. Read at your own risk.
If you've enjoyed Chrichton's past novels, there's a good chance you'll enjoy Prey, but it's really just a collection of tired sci-fi cliches made to look new by the addition of nanotechnology. I won't comment much on the actual science of the book, since I really don't know much about nanotech, but some of it just seemed a tad hokey. The whole Body Snatchers idea seemed both implausible and overused.
Timeline was much better; I cared about its characters a lot more, which were more fully-developed. Most of Prey's characters, especially the "hacker" types, are nothing more than Star Trek redshirts: they get few sentences of exposition, and a few chapters later, they're dead. The most interesting ones get killed off first, too. Also, all of the hacker characters fit into a broad geek stereotype: there's the quiet geek, the punk grrl geek, the fat slob geek, and the anal geek. Not much imagination there.
Overall, it's entertaining, if you don't think too much about it, but Crichton's done better.
The article talks about a "Singularity" in humankind's development, an event where man develops a machine that will outhink him. This leads to an acceleration, a new evolution, an exponential runaway beyond any hope of control.
The author explains why this will occur, how, and when; between 2005 and 2030. He also gets into ramifications of a post-Singularity world, and the paths that may lead us there, along with some pros and cons of each choice.
There are references to some works of science fiction (though none from Chriton), and a passing reference to the possibility of engendering a set of laws in the machines. Surprisingly, Asimov's Laws Of Robotics was not metioned.
His final quote is taken from Freeman Dyson:
This asks the question - when Man changes, will our God change as well?
The ants in Them.
The rats in Willard.
The bees in The Swarm.
The Borg in Star Trek.
And now the nanites in Prey.
As a Slashdotter, I am grossly offended by hive-minds being consistently portrayed as the bad guys. I hereby call subliminally to all my fellow
Respectfully,
536185 of 630000
Just for once, I'd like the cute kids to be introduced only to die horribly and painfully soon after. That might make his books barely tolerable even if the rest of it is one cinematic plot device after another.
Crichton is a Luddite in Tech clothing, authoring
repeated revisions of the Frankenstein's monster tale. His treatment of Science and Technology is always superficial and usually flawed in detail.
He can write, but he's no Asimov.
It's a good book and it's going to make a great movie.
This is my main complaint with the Crichton books in the past 10 years. All of the ones I read are basically movie scripts "disguised" as books. I read The Great Train Robbery (one of his books from the 70s) a couple years ago, and it was much better writing.
Stanislaw Lem (Of Solaris fame) wrote an excellent book called Invincible over twenty years ago that dealt with a renegade swarm of tiny, evolving creatures in a much more interesting manner. It's worth seeking out and reading. Prey, by contrast, was simplistically written and predictably plotted. Glad I saved $25 by reading it in a series of bookstores. I fear that nano- is going to be one of the most overhyped prefixes this decade, just like cyber- was in the late 80's/early 90's and i- and e- were in the late 90's.
Oh, you idiot. I'm sick of lame "in soviet russia" posts. A well-constructed one is funny, but this shit is just lame.
The correct "in soviet russia" post for this article is as follows:
In Soviet Russia, Michael Crichton's latest book, Prey, writes the review below of cybrpnk2!
I read the book and it fucking sucked in terms of plot, timeline, credibility, character development, and just about any thing else... but I couldn't put the damn thing down and had to finish it in one day.
All life is a swarm. We share a common ancestor with every virus.
Sig for sale or rent. One previous user. Inquire within.
But my fellow /.er we must analyze our enemy, get to know our enemy, even love our enemy so that we may thoroughly understand our enemy. Then we destroy the enemy. Not just hurt them, but put hurt them so bad that they don't get back up.
612884 of 630000
Life moves pretty fast; if you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it. -FB
You're actually 536185 of 631950. I just wanted to keep your facts straight. Preach on, brother!
1. protaganist witnesses/writes/experiences something they shouldn't have.
2. Bad Guys find out and try to kill protaganist.
3. Government agency gets involved on behalf of Bad Guys.
4. Protaganist comes through by threatening to reveal Bad Guy secrets to world.
I need my fix.
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
I personally love every one of MC's books and own them all. He spices a touch of science fiction, but uses the same idea as Sixth Day with "the not so distant future". He takes new technologies that are more than likely going to become standard ... and puts them in his books. Some people really need to understand that there's a reason there are so many books, obviously no one is going to like them all.
Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed
Is it my imagination, or does Michael Crichton now write on the level of a seventh grade english student? Since when does a book that is written in the first person with such stilted prose constitute "good"?
Much like Airframe, the book would benefit by just giving up the ghost and being in screen-play format. If you read it like that, it is pretty much about a minute of screen time per 3 pages. The leading and typography are huge, so the book is filled out, but really its very fluffy.
I'll plod through, because I can't stand not finishing books.
A good book on nanotechnology? I'll take the Diamond Age and Neil Stephenson's subpar ability to end a book over Crichton's halting prose any day.
Can someone recommend something to me? I just got done rereading Harry Potter (guilty pleasure), so I'm headed for the bookstore tonight. Here's sort of what I'm interested in: I'd like to read something by Niven, Gaiman, Stephenson (even the Big U), Gibson, Bret Ellis, Eric Nylund or Chuck Palahniuk, but I've already read everything they've written. I'm looking for something on that range; I'm not ready to read anything too brainy at the moment -- getting ready to embark on another Karen Armstrong book...
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
As another user mentioned, though, when I first heard of Prey, my first thought was Greg Bear's old novel "Blood Music", where nanotechnology evolves into an intelligent race and society, all within the body of a scientist, and eventually learns the true nature of their world, which they prepare to leave. I enjoy novels (and films and television shows, for that matter) that are not afraid to end the story on a note that promises imminent, radical change for the world. It sounds like Prey doesn't do that, which is unfortunate.
Looking for political forums? Check out "The World Forum".
Now that book was terrible. First one that I had read of his that I didn't like. I was so disappointed.
Maybe I'm just looking at it through rose-tinted reading glasses but the Andromeda Strain and Congo, I thought, were two of his absolute best. Sphere was totally engrossing at first then kind of a let down. Terminal Man was certainly interesting, although I can not remember much from it being great. Never read Jurassic Park, though.
I was in high-school when I read all these though. Maybe he has lost it, however.
why run from Vincenzo?
His best book, by far, was Intern. It is a journal of his year as a medical intern, and an excellent insight into health care in the US. It was published at the time under the pseudonym Dr. X.
I highly reccommend it over any of his recent work.
Rob
Arrogant scientists unleash a horror which gets out of control.
Hero dispatches said horror after it kills arrogant scientists.
Conclusion (voice-over): "There Are Some Things That Man Was Not Meant To Know".
I'll stick with Neal Stephenson, thanks.
I used to like MC, in 7th grade.
Now I look at his stuff and it's a train wreck. Read Travels and you find that he's a vindictive yuppie jerk behind the scenes.
It's not totally OT, since I often see some lost soul on these book reviews with Stephen King and Crichton in their eyes going "He rites soo good!"....
I heartily recommend reading John Gardner's Art of Fiction and disabusing yourself of the 90% of writers that are just whoring to keep the 'vette gassed up. While you're looking at comments on the book, bear in mind the people that hate it are the ones that feel like writing shouldn't be work. Bullshit.
Stephenson, even with his sometimes smug flights (ITBWTCL anyone?), at least puts his back into it to write a good story - you know he's done his research, which is as it should be. Crichton could care less - he only cares what you think about him as it relates to profit margins.
Wake up!
^xs
^xc
Keep your packets off my GNU/Girlfriend!
s it my imagination, or does Michael Crichton now write on the level of a seventh grade english student? Since when does a book that is written in the first person with such stilted prose constitute "good"?
Much like Airframe, the book would benefit by just giving up the ghost and being in screen-play format. If you read it like that, it is pretty much about a minute of screen time per 3 pages. The leading and typography are huge, so the book is filled out, but really its very fluffy.
I'll plod through, because I can't stand not finishing books.
A good book on nanotechnology? I'll take the Diamond Age and Neil Stephenson's subpar ability to end a book over Crichton's halting prose any day.
You couldn't tell what was sloppy writing and what was meant to be Significant. "The ship just happens to land in such a way that people can walk on the floors and everthing isn't thrown around?... not important. A character takes one look at something totally unexpected and inexplicable and calmly explains its function and significance?... not important. A bunch of horseshit about how computer memory works... okay, typical Crichton sloppiness, but the guy who wants to write his will? IMPORTANT!!11"
There's only one Crichton book with a beginning, a middle AND and end and no glaring internal inconsistencies, and that's The Great Train Robbery. Read it, then go back to ignoring Crichton.
Try changing the encoding (in View -> Character Encoding).
My Mom is totally pumped about "Taken," but I can't be bothered. Gee, do you suppose a preternatually wise kid will be the hero? Do you think he or she might hit all the high points of the Hero's Journey but never be in any real danger? Ya think the aliens will seem menacing at first, but turn out to be benevolent and generous, only the dumb military guys will be too thick to "get it"? Do you think the message "firearms = T3H 3V1L" will be subliminally pounded into the viewer's skull? And I wonder if Nazis will show up! I just bet they will!
It seems there are a lot of opinions floating around the responses about how good/bad the book/author is. What I'm sensing is social impact, where posters are revealing more about themselves than the author. I know none of your authority on book review or writing skills, so I can't feel anything is objective here.
Okay, with that heady intro, that's what a MC book feels like to me: A study on the personal reactions to an event in a few character studies, rather than the sweeping impact on a society or world. Something in reality is altered, pulled from the pile of sci-fi-tech ideas that are culturally new, and a bunch of characters play the "how'd you do that?", "what happens if?", "is this goes haywire then don't you think..." The reader is expected (and usually does) fall into one of the book's character studies for reactions. Then, it goes haywire, and the rush to save the state occurs. Then, he wraps it all up and puts said emergency back on the shelf.
For me, a novel has to have a lot less said about reactions, and just present events and characters moving through the world. I may agree or disagree with any number of them. I mean, how many of you say something like "oh! thats very stupid Mr Character!" when reading his stuff? But the events have to world-altering, in a permanent way, to seem real to me.
For example, wouldn't it make a much more compelling read to take the Andromeda Strain concept and rewrite it like a history of the AIDS pandemic? Then, we'd be fighting time for a cure, studying the social and political viewpoints (and mis-educations), and really sweep through the planet. To me, this is one scary story. But we all know the details in that one, so fiction has to struggle to be stranger...
mug
at any rate, it's a hell of a book, and a stark departure from his usual works. the closest comparison is probably to The Terminal Man (incidentally one of my favorites), but only because they both deal with medical stories.
pick it up if you get a chance. amazon link
It really felt like Crichton himself lost interest after the first act and had an intern finish off the story from there. He sets up the science and the mystery very nicely in the beginning, then turns it into a stupid "predator hunts prey, prey kills predator" story that's been done much better thousands of times before (even by Crichton himself). He even goes so far as to completely and intentionally ruin every possible element of suspense by dropping extremely heavy hints and using copious amounts of foreshadowing at every possible turn. By the first ten pages of the second section, I knew how the book would end and who would die.
As if the plot flaws aren't enough, Crichton chose to write this book in the first-person, which is uncommon for him. I'm not sure what his reasoning was there. At first I enjoyed the perspective; Crichton's third-person narrative tends to be one-dimensional and patronizing, and in the beginning it looked like that was going to change. But, like everything else, that too stopped being the case after the first section. It seems like Crichton really struggled with the fact that he had limited himself to being able to tell the story from only one point of view. At one point, he even goes so far as to have the narrator describe, in detail, a scene that takes place without him present, explaining it by saying that the narrator saw the events later by watching security tapes. Nevermind that he's already told us the security tapes only show ten-frame intervals from each camera and cycle through all the cameras in this huge facility, nor do they record sound (and yet, strangely, the narrator somehow heard the dialog in this particular scene).
In short, while it's not a horrible book, Prey is no Andromeda Strain and no Jurassic Park. It's not even a Lost World. It's better than Timeline, but only just barely.
"classic Crichton claptrap" -- NY Times (subscription, heh-heh)
There was a pretty decent interview w/ Crichton on NPR's Talk of the Nation - Science Friday today.
The archive audio is usually available in a day or two. The page for this show is here.
Funny you should write this. As I was reading the review, I couldn't help being reminded of Stanislaw Lem's excellent novel Invincible, which in fact asks this very question (about 40 years ago).
Like most of Lem's books, it is multifaceted, exploring themes of self-other confrontation, mind-body relationship, and human loneliness and arrogance; all in a juicy hard-SF story. While the tech in the story is dated, the novel's relevance as science fiction remains fresh today. (In passing, I would have thought that Invicible would have been much more obvious movie material than Solaris (also a great novel, for different reasons).)
Chrichton's The Andromeda Strain, by contrast, struck me as being a fine thriller with high-tech elements, but not particularly exciting as science fiction. If this new novel is similar, I suspect that my impression will be the same.
Go read Invincible, you may like it.
The problem I see is that the reviewer accidently used the hyphenated word 'sci-fi'. It never once occured to me to consider any of Crichton's works as 'sci-fi'. In fact, go to a book store. I worked at Borders for a period of time, and they had a couple of Crichton's books in sci-fi, which surprised me because Barnes and Noble had always carried all of Crichton's books in the regular fiction section. Indeed, Crichton's books were never intended to be in the same genre as Orson Scott Card or Connie Willis (If you haven't read 'Dooms Day Book' by Willis, I highly recommend it. It won a couple awards; it is very excellent).
Books like Prey are a post-modern perspective on how the world is developing. Jurassic Park came out around the time that the high level gene studies first started to come around. Human Genome Project website, "Begun in 1990, the U.S. Human Genome Project is a 13-year effort...". Coinciding, Jurassic Park was published in 1991. Prey is a similar concept, we know nanotech is under developement as we speak. An interesting page with nanotech resources: zyvex.com.
Certainly, Crichton's books aren't perfect, but I think they succeed in what they intend to do. They are very readable (I read Jurassic Park in 6th grade [am I that young?]), and usually suspense filled. They also try to maintain a level of realism even while stretching the bounds of technology. I thought it was fairly clever to incorporate modern distributed computing design into the nanotechnology in his book. His books are always well researched, go to the last few page of prey and you will find a list of sources that he used for information. I think prey is one of his better books I've read in a while. Timeline was good, and Airframe disappointed me.
I say, if you are looking for a sci-fi read, Crichton isn't really the go to guy. But, his books are generally good, no less; and Prey is a good one.
Don't you hate that? I mean, you go through all the trouble and background checks and retinal scans to get to these cool secretive labs and then, almost immediately, everything goes straight to hell.
Oh well, at least that won't happen this next time. I've got this great job lined up at a place called 'Black Mesa'. I'm pretty sure everything there is on the up-and-up.
-Denor
well, where I live, which is Switzerland by the way, I never saw a bookstore where they would even think of putting Crichton in the "regular fiction" or "science-fiction" section. Instead, they correctly put him in the "crime (or crap)" section together with Robin Cook, Douglas Preston and Matthew Reilley (he is the worst btw). Of course, I am here only talking about the english-book section of the said bookstores.
And Prey is certainly not a "post-modern perspective on how the world is developing", since there is no realistic chance that the usual Crichtonesque WASPisch hero will single-handedly save the world at the end of the post-modern day
between Crichton and Someone Who Actually Knows the science he's writing about:
Crichton - "So, is what I'm proposing possible, or even theoretical, given today's science?"
SWAK: "Well..."
Crichton: "Good enough for me! Bye"
[Click]
That's gotta fit into your schema somewhere
He's extremely tall - six feet nine inches.
He's extremely rich - from movies like Jurassic Park, and especially the TV show he created, ER, one of the most successful shows in history. He's got hundreds of millions of dollars.
He was going through a nasty divorce with his wife while writing Prey, a fact which perhaps influences the good-dad-bad-mom dynamic in the early part of the book.
See *here* for a review.
Basically, he doesn't know science, the story isn't even realistic, and the horror scenes are all derivative. Evolution doesn't work the way he says it does.
The review contains spoilers, but trust me, you won't miss anything.
Chris
Ask me about Nanotechnology, Dyslexia Correction. Tell me about A.I., robotics, infrastructure.
This book has fantastic pace. I bought it tonight while waiting for a bus, and five hours later, I've finished it. It's rare that my undivided reading attention is captured without an occassional break.
That said, this book would make an excellent movie. Or, perhaps not.
It would be a movie that constantly moves forward, never allowing for boredom. Unfortunately, as is usual for Crichton, a forceful suspension of disbelief is required in order to accept the technology, plot, and characters.
Using his patented writing process, Crichton chooses and researches a concept until he understands the lingo, and then weaves a story around it. The resulting stories, including Prey, do fall far short of being scientific. However, they are at least scientifically entertaining.
Prey deals with the topics of nanotechnology, evolution, and distributed intelligence, and the consequences of such technology running amuck.
Crichton takes an immature science and, at the first plausible experimentation of that science, parlays it into the worst possible scenario over which his heroes must triumph. Unfortunately, this formula is continually overused within his patented process.
In a Crichton world, if somehow the government developed an anti-gravity machine, then the very first experimentation of that machine would result in massive negative consequences. Not the second experiment, or the experiment five years from now, but the First. And it wouldn't be gradual-bad, like pollution or the ozone layer. It would be all-at-once bad.
In reality, technology never works well enough to fail so horribly right from the start. To quote Prey, "To believe otherwise was to believe that the Wright brothers could build a rocket and fly to the moon instead of flying three hundred feet over sand dunes at Kitty Hawk."
Instead of considering the millions of reasons of why something wouldn't go wrong, Crichton focuses on the one or two improbable ways in which it might. The reader is forced to accept ten or so of these conditions in a row, increasingly invalidating any excuses for bad things to get worse.
Consequently, a scientific subject that was researched carefully turned into something that would only appeal to unscientific minds (perhaps those likely to see the movie.)
Since the premise for Crichton's books have not been ruled out entirely, it isn't difficult to overlook the technological absurdities. However, it is much more painful to experience Crichton's treatment of the characters within this story.
A forty year old programmer-turned-househusband and father of three continually makes decisions as though solving a technical problem was more important than protecting his family. At one dangerous place he dies nearly three times, but doesn't care whether his wife leaves the hospital prematurely to come join him. The protaganist never agonizes over anything; he thinks scientifically but plans unscientifically, and takes time between death scenes to tell his children not to argue. The contrived motivations within the plot demean any depth these characters might have had. If Crichton expects us to relate to any of them, I don't know why.
In short, Prey will take away your hours and leave you entertained. But your scientific mind may hate you for it.
They use Thermite to blow up swarms of nanobots. Except thermite does not explode, only burn with a very high temperature.
He confuses photovoltaic with piezoelectric in several places, this is high-school stuff...
Many of the measurements are off. One device is described as one billionth of an inch. Only problem is that this is about the size of a single atom, and thus it's inconceivable that you could construct a nanobot this small.
His concept of "evolution" is absurd, and would appear so to anyone with even a very basic understanding of evolution. Evolution has to do with the survival of the more fit organisms. "evolution" can not be used to explain that one swarm of nanobots learn to evade the thermite after watching another nearby be anihilated by it. This is called "learning" and is not the same as evolution.
The list goes on. Frankly, for me it was enough to make the entire story more annoying than enjoyable. Everything doesn't need to be 100% realistic, but it's too stupid when a person writing about science doesn't even know high-school stuff like what a the photovoltaic effect is.
I didn't read the book, just glanced at the back of it, and read the last few pages. It seems extraordinarily simplistic from the few paragraphs I read.
Rather than discussing the book (I clearly can't) I wonder what other slashdotters think about the `dangers' of nanotechology.
There was the incredibly poorly informed article by Bill Joy in Wired. It seems that this book might be exploiting the same vein. Of course if we could create (1) nano-machines capable of (2) self-reproduction, which (3) lived off sunlight and (4) were programmed for destruction we might have a problem.
It seems to me that we haven't the slightest clue as to how to go about fullfilling any of those 4 goals.
(1) is barely at the demonstration stage (look, a tiny motor! I swear it works!)
(2) is not even in sight. don't the demonstration project in (1) require a fully-fledged silicon fab unit?
(3) suffers from the same problem. Sure we can build macroscopic solar cells, but do they scale down?
(4) is basically AI. I think we can agree we are not there yet.
To me these nanobots really are science fiction. I'm more worried about gene manipulations in bacteria myself.
Anything by Iain M Banks, as long as it's got the M (Iain Banks is the same guy writing contemporary fiction - good, but not as good. Creator of the oft-mentioned Culture. Check out his ship names for an idea of the tone - dark, sometimes funny, often disturbing, always clever.