The Michael Crichton thread
 

Discuss the books and movies and tv shows and papers and opinions of this great man.

Including the new stuff that will be coming out. That's right, 2 new books will be coming out shortly.

One is a pirate adventure with Crichton's own twist on it of course, called "Pirate Latitudes".


The other is simply listed as "Untitled Techno Thriller". I think it'd be interesting if they just released it without a title. An idea is that the book should first be released untitled, then Crichton fans, after having read the book will come up with a name for the book, and you can vote on it at the official website.

Although, the musician in me, likes the idea of like the "Unfinished Symphony" (other musicians might know what I'm talking about there), and publish the book and leave it as "Untitled Techno Thriller".

There's the possibility that Crichton did manage to title this before passing on, and they want to leave it a mystery before the book comes out. There was also an apparent announcement looking for experienced writers to help finish the book. Any writers here?

Also apparently there's a couple more rumored even after these two books hit.

I was hoping this would happen. A couple more books to be released after he has passed on. Pirate Latitudes sounds great.

So... discuss.

Sphere, Jurassic, Congo, Eaters of the Dead, Lost World, fantastic books, such poor film adaptations, (except for Jurassic) There are few really good movie adaptations of his work out there which is surprising because so many of his books would make fantastic movies, unfortunately, many of those books have already been made into movies and are pretty bad.

I have Prey on the shelf, was going to start reading that one soon. Anyone out there, read it? Like it?

13th Warrior is probably the best film adaptation of one of his books and it's a pretty good movie too. There were a lot of differences but it was closer to the book than any of his others. Disclosure was pretty close and it was okay. Rising Sun, it was spot on until it turned into martial arts movie at the end for some reason.

It's pretty good. Told in first person method. It's Crichton's way of a prequel to all the "machine takeover" scenerios. Unlike other man vs. machine stories, this one starts at the microscopic level.

A lot of people compare it to "Andromeda Strain" in terms of the plot development. And yeah I guess I can see that, but Prey is creepy.

I really hope they turn this one into a movie.

Pirate Latitudes
 

Okay, here's what I'm looking forward to in this new book. We're not going to get "Pirates of the Carribean" here.

We're most likely going to get something along the lines of "Eaters of the Dead" and "The Great Train Robbery". What made those books great was the way Crichton presented them with a huge sense of authenticity. Both those books were pretty loosely based on original material (there really was a great train robbery in 1855, and Ahmad ibn Fadlan was a real historical figure), but the way Crichton tells it, you'd think you were reading a textbook (in a good way of course, still full of suspense and good storytelling).

That's what I'm expecting with this new Pirate novel. Something that's presented with a pure sense of authenticity, even told in an old style writing like Eaters was. Now that'd be cool. It'd be like a journal written by a deckhand or something. Anyway, I won't get my hopes up on specifics like that, but authenticity is something I'll be expecting with a story like this from Crichton.

We'll see come November. :)