Book Review:

Timeline by Michael Crichton

   I am a big Michael Crichton fan.  Sphere is probably my favorite book of all time.  Other favorites include A Case of Need, Rising Sun, The Andromeda Strain, and Jurassic Park.  So I eagerly anticipated Crichton's latest, Timeline.

    The funny thing was, before I ever got to it, I came across a review of it in the New York Times Book Review.  The reviewer didn't seem to find too much fault, except that he had one complaint of Crichton in general: all his books read exactly the same.

    And to a point, I probably agree with this, despite being the Crichton fan that I am.  Most of his novels involve some sort of race against the clock, since this helps to build suspense.   In just about all of them (or at least all the ones I like), something scientifically interesting (occasionally medically interesting) goes haywire, and it's up to the main characters to work it out, usually having first lost their experienced help.

    Sphere: Norman Johnson, Beth Halpern, and Harry Adams are the three main characters.  They travel underwater to look at what seems to be a spaceship that has been under the ocean for hundreds of years.  Through several odd accidents, the people who actually know what they're doing are killed, and eventually Norman, Beth, and Harry must race against the clock to make it back to the surface, where a typhoon has for some time made it impossible to go back up.

    Now look at the plot of Timeline: Edward Johnston, Chris Hughes, Kate Erickson, David Stern, and André Marek are working on excavating and reconstructing a medieval castle, backed by a company named ITC.  ITC has, unbeknownst to the five (there are others, but they are the principals), developed a way to travel back in time, from where they are looking at the castle as it originally stood.  Johnston finds out about this when an ITC employee lets slip that there is a tower in a certain place, when no one in the present had known about that.

    Johnston demands to go back, unbeknownst to the other four, at least until they find a lens from his bifocals and a piece of paper in his handwriting saying "HELP ME" in an area they had never been in before.

    Stern eventually decides not to go, but Hughes, Erickson, and Marek travel back to 1357 to find Johnston and bring him back to the present.  Almost immediately after they get there, their two ITC guides, the people who actually know what they're doing, are killed, leaving the three on their own in medieval France.

    Too conveniently, Marek speaks Occitan, and they all have earpiece translators, so they're okay.  But the batteries on the devices will wear out after 37 hours, so the four must race against the clock to make it back to 1999, where an explosion in the transport room has for some time made it impossible to go back.

    So, how familiar does that sound?

    But despite that, I really enjoyed Timeline.  It's got all the excitement of a Crichton book such as Sphere, and I wouldn't hesitate to call it his second-best novel; perhaps my second-favorite of all-time.  The detail is rich and, as with all Crichton novels, clearly heavily researched.  Crichton said that it "took me almost twice as long to write as any other book except Jurassic Park," and it shows in the detail, and the quality of the writing.  Crichton is always good at building up tension and drama.  Here, he is superb.

    As I was reading, I came across several scenes that instinctively became movie scenes in my head.  I mean, they all did, but certain ones came across as particularly vivid, making me think of exactly how they would look on a movie screen - and how the audience would react.   But in the end, I'm not sure I'd even want to see Timeline made into a movie (though like so many of his others, it probably will be at some point).

    Because, like Sphere, I'd hate to see it ruined. A+

Timeline is published by Alfred A. Knopf, New York.  For more on Michael Crichton visit his official site.