Hello Enthusiasts,
Today's review will be Prey from author Michael Crichton, the author of Jurassic Park and The Andromeda Strain.
The story takes place at a facility in the Nevada Desert. This facility has developed a particle cloud of micro-robots to do things like take high-definition pictures of a person's insides rather than relying on X-rays. To do this, the scientists programmed the nanobots to think like predatory animal pack, which would stick together, but adjust to adverse scenarios to keep pursuing it's goal. This comes after many failed attempts with other types of animal behavior, which wouldn't stay focused on the objective when unforeseen circumstances arise, or the nanobots would split away from the pack formation. As it turns out, the only type of behavior that handled both of these was that of a predator. As the story goes on, the tiny machines being to learn, and they begin to hunt. Now it's up to the remaining scientists at the facility, led by their former manager (and our main character), Jack Forman, to stop the particle cloud before it is let loose on the rest of the world.
This book is all around enjoyable and a real page-turner. Crichton likes to toy with the idea of humans killing ourselves with technology, as he showed with genetic manipulation in Jurassic Park, so this is right up his ally. These scenes are well thought out, the story is very consistent with its details, and it's so suspenseful it feels like a movie. Crichton is great at writing the slower scenes as well as the more intense ones, which makes those more gripping scenes even more powerful.
Despite the plot not really being ground-breaking, it is clever in its execution. Without giving anything away, the strengths and weaknesses of the nanobots are well thought out. Some of their abilities can be disturbing as well, though the reader won't see the full extent of that until pretty far in to the book. I'm also a fan of the story being set in the desert; it's far enough from civilization to be secluded, but not too far for the idea of this particle cloud reaching a city to be impossible.
On the downside for this book, we have the characters. They aren't very interesting, and the dialogue is not Crichton's strongest ever. While some of the dialogue can seem sincere, especially in the slower scenes, some of it can feel rushed and very much like straight exposition. I think my biggest grievance is with our main character. He is basically perfect outside of his circumstances. He's smart, caring, moral, and seems to be in decent shape, yet he's in rough marriage where his wife doesn't seem to care about him, and he lost his job prior to the start of the novel. I feel like he would have been more relatable if he had been a bit more flawed, a little more human.
Character grievances aside, this is a really good novel. I would recommend this book to big Crichton fans or even casual readers, as the gripping nature of the story is sure to keep the pages turning, even if there are some things to gripe about afterwards. I hope this another one of his that ends up on the big screen.
I give Michael Crichton's Prey a 7 out of 10.
Sincerely,
The Bored Enthusiast
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