Next

I just finished reading Michael Crichton's newest book, "Next." I've been a big fan of Michael Chrichton since I was eleven years old, which was the same time the movie "Jurassic Park" came out. Coincidence? I think not!

Although "Next" came out over a year ago I've held off on reading it because of overwhelming negative reader reviews on amazon.com. So, I decided to wait until I could find a cheap, used copy before I would read it. The other day I found such a copy at a used book store. It costed $1.50 and it smells like its last owner was a chain smoker. I wrote a review on amazon.com so I could add my two cents about the book. Usually I don't feel a need to do that, unless I think I have something new to add to the discussion.

So, to save you the effort of hunting down my review on amazon.com which I'm sure all of you were so anxious to do, I'm posting a copy of it here. The following is my review, titled "A Crichton Storytelling Experiment Gone Amok." I gave it three (out of five) stars. Here it is:

***

About a hundred pages into "Next," I started to get worried that this book would be like Chrichton's Airframe, a book that really disappointed me because a dinosaur didn't eat the airplane. Crichton's stronger stories usually follow a small group of people (usually, but not necessarily scientists) who face off with dangerous byproducts of the irresponsible use of technology, like dinosaurs, killer nano-robots, medieval knights and giant squid. In "Next," Chrichton tries a different story structure that was successful in movies like "Crash" and "Traffic," where several stories are told simultaneously, with the only connecting tissue between them is a central theme. In "Crash" the theme was racism, in "Traffic" it was drugs, in "Next" the theme is genetics. This could have worked really well, except for the fact that the characters were overwhelmingly unpleasant and membrane thin. The theme could just as easily have been slimy lawyers, or cheating married people that hate each other, without much of a stretch.

Chrichton's strong point was never characterization, but that never bothered me before because where Chrichton's characterization really shines is not with the people, but with the dinosaurs, the nano-robots, the medieval knights, the giant squid and all the other strange creatures irresponsibly used technology can conjure up.

"Next" does have its share of said creatures. The thing that made this book worth reading (and which earned it three stars instead of two) was Gerard, the super intelligent parrot, who can do math, but even more surprising can quote movies that I never dreamed would be quoted in a Chrichton book. And Dave, the humanzee boy, who bears a lot of resemblance to bat boy, except he's half chimp, not bat. Not to mention an orangutan who can also talk, but only likes to say French swear words. The humans, on the other hand, like to say lots and lots of English swear words. Had the book put more focus on these characters, instead of the humans, I would have been a much happier reader.