Uneven but never dull, See’s seventh (after The Handyman, 1999, etc.) throws an idiosyncratic light on our contemporary age...
Death jostles a diverse group of Californians but it’s the life force that prevails here.
Los Angeles, 2001. Edith is a well-heeled white Angeleno. Her beloved second husband Charlie dies in her arms after a long illness. The next morning, she watches on television the collapse of the Twin Towers, but the catastrophe doesn’t amount to a hill of beans next to her own loss. Her reaction sets the tone for a novel that elevates personal pain and joy above collective anxiety and jingoism. On to 2007. The war in Iraq drags on; everybody is edgy. Edith, a lonely widow, is a volunteer receptionist at UCLA Medical Center, where her son, Phil Fuchs, is a dermatologist. Phil has problems at home. His whiny wife Felicia is worried about aging. Daughter Eloise is an obnoxious brat. Vernon, 11, for whom Phil feels a “terrible, soft, embarrassing love,” is acting up like crazy. At the hospital, he’s chosen to join a top-secret team organized by the military to treat future bioterrorism victims; he is refused permission to leave the program when he becomes disaffected. In the reception room, two families are on tenterhooks. The Barclays and their daughter Andrea are hoping for a kidney for her father, a university lecturer, who is fading fast. The other family are recent Chinese immigrants; an uncle is on a respirator. Danny has seen Andrea in undergraduate poetry class. Almost before they know what’s happening, they’re making love in the campus Botanical Garden; mutual desire is that strong, and it keeps death at bay. Phil’s world comes crashing down when he finds Felicia flaunting her lover Larry (“in security”) at her 40th birthday bash. Divorce looms, and prospective stepfather Larry is threatening Vern with military school. Disregarding a hospital emergency summons, Phil acts fast to save Vern and himself; it’s a gloriously improbable plan, but it works.
Uneven but never dull, See’s seventh (after The Handyman, 1999, etc.) throws an idiosyncratic light on our contemporary age of anxiety.Pub Date: May 23, 2006
ISBN: 0-679-46317-8
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2006
Pub Date: April 7, 1998
ISBN: 0-446-52356-9
Page Count: 322
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1998
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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