A riveting, thought-provoking story disguised as a fast-paced thriller.
A debut novel spins a tale about studying killer whales to find hope for the future.
Tech billionaire David James Parker is close to introducing a cutting-edge artificial intelligence named Soti. But his estranged father, James, dies, sending DJ off on a new path. DJ’s younger brother, Jonathan Joseph, is an autistic savant so James named DJ as the executor of his estate. James was wealthy, made rich by his OneWorld Marine Park franchise. In a video, James explains to DJ that what he really wants him to do is to continue the research he had begun into how orcas (killer whales) communicate. With the aid of Soti and the sensitive JJ, DJ’s research determines that the orcas use telepathic resonance (linked by thoughts over long distances). DJ believes he can transfer this form of communication to humans and plans to offer it free to everyone. But officials of the Kremlin-connected Neftkomp company, which is seeking to buy OneWorld, steal one version of Soti, hoping to figure out how to use telepathic resonance so that Russia can regain global superiority. Attempts to squelch the Russian scheme result in a rising body count. Meanwhile, the orcas resist DJ’s plan to give their secret to humans and leave him to wrestle with whether he is trying to open a Pandora’s box. Swanson is a marine naturalist who has long studied the Washington state-based orcas known as the Southern Resident Killer Whales, which are featured in his novel. He even includes the thoughts of the orcas, as translated by JJ or Soti. The author deserves credit for having good guys and bad guys among both the Americans and Russians rather than heavy-handedly favoring one side. His protagonist is thorough and conscientious, and he’s surrounded by a Greek chorus of associates who force DJ to consider every angle of his potentially world-changing decision. This clever thriller is effectively paced, as both sides race to crack the orcas’ code, one working for humanity and the other striving for domination. Swanson leaves readers debating whether DJ makes the right call in the end.
A riveting, thought-provoking story disguised as a fast-paced thriller.Pub Date: Aug. 24, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-73270-250-9
Page Count: 294
Publisher: Pendrell Sound Press
Review Posted Online: April 22, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
Genetically engineered dinosaurs run amok in Crichton's new, vastly entertaining science thriller. From the introduction alone—a classically Crichton-clear discussion of the implications of biotechnological research—it's evident that the Harvard M.D. has bounced back from the science-fantasy silliness of Sphere (1987) for another taut reworking of the Frankenstein theme, as in The Andromeda Strain and The Terminal Man. Here, Dr. Frankenstein is aging billionaire John Hammond, whose monster is a manmade ecosystem based on a Costa Rican island. Designed as the world's ultimate theme park, the ecosystem boasts climate and flora of the Jurassic Age and—most spectacularly—15 varieties of dinosaurs, created by elaborate genetic engineering that Crichton explains in fascinating detail, rich with dino-lore and complete with graphics. Into the park, for a safety check before its opening, comes the novel's band of characters—who, though well drawn, double as symbolic types in this unsubtle morality play. Among them are hero Alan Grant, noble paleontologist; Hammond, venal and obsessed; amoral dino-designer Henry Wu; Hammond's two innocent grandchildren; and mathematician Ian Malcolm, who in long diatribes serves as Crichton's mouthpiece to lament the folly of science. Upon arrival, the visitors tour the park; meanwhile, an industrial spy steals some dino embryos by shutting down the island's power—and its security grid, allowing the beasts to run loose. The bulk of the remaining narrative consists of dinos—ferocious T. Rex's, voracious velociraptors, venom-spitting dilophosaurs—stalking, ripping, and eating the cast in fast, furious, and suspenseful set-pieces as the ecosystem spins apart. And can Grant prevent the dinos from escaping to the mainland to create unchecked havoc? Though intrusive, the moralizing rarely slows this tornado-paced tale, a slick package of info-thrills that's Crichton's most clever since Congo (1980)—and easily the most exciting dinosaur novel ever written. A sure-fire best-seller.
Pub Date: Nov. 7, 1990
ISBN: 0394588169
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1990
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