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Feb 04, 2011

Brad rated it:

I always seem to forget how good Jurassic Park is. I blast through it once every few years, throw it on my shelf and the distance slowly makes me derisive, and then something forces me to pick it up again when my brain needs a little peanut butter and jelly dipped in hot chocolate, and I am forced to admit that Jurassic Park is a damn fine novel.

Sure it's packed with Michael Crichton's usual band of screenplay-adaptation-friendly archetypes, sure it derives much of its plot and though More...

11 comments like (27 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

Julie added it

I'm going to confess something really dorky and a bit embarassing about myself.

When I was in Jr. High I loved Michael Crichton and John Grisham. LOVED them. At the time, I had read almost all of their books.

Imagine me, twelve years old, huge coke-bottle glasses, puff-paint scrunchie, catholic school uniform, pulling The Andromeda Strain out of my desk during silent reading.

Are you kidding me?

I even did an oral book report in seventh grade on The C More...

11 comments like (20 people liked it)

Nov 06, 2011

Simeon rated it:

Science-at-the-brink-of-chaos fiction. Nonlinear dynamics had barely been invented, and there it was, gracing each chapter with a foreboding message of disintegration.

Not literature, not amazing prose, but a true edge-of-your-seat thriller.

0 comments like (10 people liked it)

Dec 21, 2011

Ryan rated it:

Jurassic Park is Michael Crichton's masterwork. The academics are cooler, the science is hipper, and the monsters are badder. So why haven't you read this novel?

Let's look at the premise: We can use cloning technology to bring dinosaurs back, and now the fabulously wealthy Mr. John Hammond is going to sell glimpses of those dinosaurs in order to make money, "a lot of money," as Mr. Hammond would remind us. Alan Grant, Ellie Sattler, and Ian Malcolm are brought to a Caribbea More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Oct 25, 2007

Monk rated it:

As a child, my parents (mostly my mother) encouraged me to read 'real books' about historical stuff (which bored the hell out of me) and to tackle topics that were relevant or based in fact (boy did that not hold). When I petitioned to read this book, mom and dad shot it down (and at that age they held the purse strings) and tried to get me to read some book about Medieval Italy (boooooring).

Two years leter, they caved and let me get this book. It was wonderful.

Crichton i More...

1 comment like (5 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Matthew rated it:

I remember reading this for the first time in the 5th grade. It was late spring, and the weather was gorgeous outside. Then, from out of nowhere, a storm started brewing. The wind violently rustled the trees, the sky boomed with the sound of distant thunder... and I imagined it was one of the tropical storms described in this book.

Granted, I lived in Ohio at the time, but you can't fault a kid's imagination. It was a perfect backdrop for me whilst reading this novel.

Frank More...

0 comments like (9 people liked it)

Aug 25, 2011

Keely rated it:

With Crichton, it is always a gamble whether whatever strange and new idea has latched onto will overcome his overbearing personality. His assurance that science will always go wrong makes for easy potboiler plots, but you do get the feeling that if he were a caveman, he would mistrust a sharpened stick.

Crichton's sensationalism and misuse of scientific concepts has made him untrustworthy as a guide on any serious issue, but in the case of runaway dinosaurs, we do not need to heed hi More...

6 comments like (2 people liked it)

Oct 06, 2011

Drew rated it:

Sometimes I worry that my taste in books is getting really snobby. Then I read something like Jurassic Park, and realize that that is exactly true. I can't just sit back and absorb the brilliantly original (as far as I know) idea and the deftly told action scenes. For some reason I have to quibble over awkward sentences, clumsy exposition, and strange dialogue tags. I can't accept Crichton's weird Luddite agenda, even though ordinarily I'd agree with a lot of his points, because he tries to More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jul 08, 2009

Allison (The Allure of Books) rated it:

I'm really surprised by how much I enjoyed this book! I have seen the movie several times, and always enjoy it...and now I appreciate it even more, because it makes things left vague in the movie make so much more sense.

The added character development (and even dinosaur development, for that matter) make the book fly above and beyond anything a movie could ever recreate.

2 comments like (4 people liked it)

Jun 23, 2008

Mike rated it:

Dinosaur=Terrible Lizard

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Apr 25, 2009

Aaron rated it:

(just noticed I picked the Spanish edition by accident. I don't know how to change this, but, obviously, I didn't read it in Spanish. Though that would probably be cool. Would the [small:] amount of dialogue already in Spanish be in Spanish, or in English or something else?)

Still a fun read after all these years. Haven't read it since I was in sixth or seventh grade, and it's still awesome. The writing is clean as it gets, with some remarkably memorable visceral imagery. Of course, w More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Jul 08, 2009

Becky rated it:

I really enjoyed this book. I saw the movie of course, numerous times, so I had an idea of what to expect going in, but I was still pleasantly surprised by the book. More so after not liking The Andromeda Strain, which was the first Crichton book I ever read.

I have to say, this was a classic case of BBM: Book's Better than the Movie. As I read this, I had the movie playing right along in my head. There were some substantial differences, more background information on the characters More...

8 comments like (4 people liked it)

Oct 14, 2008

Andrew rated it:

Apart from being a good imaginative thriller, the novel says something important (which the film glosses over) that really struck me. One of the scientists states that knowledge we do not acquire by our own efforts is like inherited wealth: we do not properly respect it because we did not bear the cost of winning it. As Malcolm, the scientist, points out, when we have to earn money we take care how we spend it. When we have to learn things by our own sweat, we appreciate the things we are dealin More...

1 comment like (2 people liked it)

Jul 08, 2009

Jason rated it:

“Jurassic Park” was my first Michael Crichton book. I had heard somewhere that he was a writer like Tom Clancy who would spend pages and pages dwelling on technical details while neglecting the story. I went in without expectations.
Crichton is a writer of the best quality. Not only does he weave an interesting story with complicated, relatable characters, he also explains and educates things to the reader in an entertaining way.
The book is a lot like the movie, but many things are More...

0 comments like (5 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

Tom rated it:

I have never been terribly impressed with Crichton's work, but I have always been told that I must read Jurassic Park to really appreciate him.

I was not expecting much from this book, but I was disappointed nonetheless. The whole story seemed fragmented and disorganized. This was supposed to be about a sort of fantasy world created by an eccentric, wealthy man, but throughout the book I felt like It was more Michael Crichton's fantasy than anybody else's. It was as if he had sev More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Feb 05, 2008

Dani rated it:

I read this book a kerzillion times when I was 12, not only because a plot that involves dinosaurs coming to life is tewtally OFF DA CHAIN, but also because it excited me to read all the curse words.

Great book - it is what it is, a straight-up thriller, and it definitely delivers. Suspense, gore, mad science, and characters that are well-drawn enough to make you care whether or not they make it out alive.

Also, I think this is the first book I ever read in which people g More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

Lisa rated it:

This book is a riveting page-turner from the start to the finish. While the events are neither truly scientific or plausible, Crichton puts in just enough real science and is a skilled enough story teller, that the story reads as almost believable; it certainly seemed “real” as I read it. The suspenseful story was a really fun read and I found it fascinating.

Note: I made the mistake of seeing the movie because I did enjoy the book so much. The movie is appallingly bad. I don’t sugge More...

7 comments like (1 person liked it)

Apr 02, 2009

Max rated it:

Why do people think of this as a mere adventure novel?

To be sure, it is gripping, and, as the kids are saying, "action-packed." But that's only skin deep, only one level, this being the level that made up the massively popular film version. Just below the surface is a masterpiece, multifaceted and multidisciplinary, sincerely philosophical, and breathtaking in its pacing and scope. All the different capacities in which the novel functions are essential; without the action, More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Jun 11, 2008

Steven rated it:

I stumbled upon this book when I was in a library with a friend. I remember never reading this book because it was extremely long. So i saw the movie, and i liked it. Now that i read it, i liked this plot very much. It makes me think of how the world would be like if we had scientist studying real live dinosaurs on a remote island. Although, if something were to go wrong it would go terribly wrong. I would give this a 3 to 4 because there were some parts that were exaggerated when it wasn't nece More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Feb 08, 2012

Donovan rated it:

This was another book I read after watching the movie. Again I found watching the movie first helped visualise the story. It is a fun read and well paced with some very good suspense built in.

Plot ***Spoilers***
The narrative begins in August 1989 by slowly tying together a series of incidents involving strange animal attacks in Costa Rica and on Isla Nublar, the main setting for the story. One of the species, a strange small lizard-like creature with three toes, is identified late More...

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Jan 28, 2012

John E. rated it:

Of the three Michael Crichton novels I've read, this one was the most accomplished and the best timed. Its main idea, that ancient DNA fragments might be recovered, reassembled into a workable genome, and used to bring back to life long-gone forms, was relatively new and was known to be plausible while not yet seeming technically achievable. Another idea Crichton employed was not new to science fiction but not at the time as solidly demonstrated in the real world as it has been since: that a lib More...

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Jan 11, 2012

Kaph rated it:

You know how people (horrible, pretentious people) always say the book is way better when you dare utter a positive opinion about a movie? If this happens to you with Jurassic Park, just regard them with pity. Maybe pat their head. Simply put, the movie negated the book’s reason for existence, hence the reason for the low score. I feel a bit bad giving it a 2 because it’s such a great idea for a story and the book pulls off the action well, but it’s simply not as good as the movie. Reading it af More...

0 comments like

Dec 29, 2011

Sebastian rated it:

I have read many novels that were later films and I have to say that just like the others, this book had many differences from the movie, but more than usual. Having many differences from the movie made reading the book so much better! There were so many little things that make up the story that were left out in the movie! I didn't want to read this book, considering that I had seen the movie, but since it had so many differences I found myself glued to the novel and I couldn't put it down for d More...

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Dec 25, 2011

Henry rated it:

Despite liking the movie, I never got around to reading the book. In some ways I am glad I waited. I enjoyed reading it knowing how genetic engineering (and other technology) has progressed since it was written. While we do not have cloned dinosaurs, we have made significant progress since 1990.

I feel that at this point, it has worked its way into culture, that there isn't much to say about it. Science is reckless and brings back dinosaurs because it can. Nature can't be controlled a More...

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Dec 13, 2011

Tiara rated it:

I'm pretty sure most people know the story by now, but if you don't, here goes nothing. An eccentric millionaire finds the funding and technology to clone dinosaurs, which he plans on turning into a tourist attraction. The government is suspicious about his motives because of some biotechnology companies have been illegally testing different "products". To prove that Jurassic Park isn't a government threat, Hammond--the millionaire--opens up his park for inspection. During a visit (pre More...

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Dec 10, 2011

Danny rated it:

Michael Crichton is a genius, and I always liked his novels. His books are filled with brilliant ideas and plenty of suspense. Michael Crichton does plenty of research in writing his novels and there is a mixture of truth and fiction in his writing. The novel Jurassic Park was one such idea that was brilliant and fascinating. The book was so good when Steven Spielberg produced the movie the script pretty much followed the book. This books was ahead of it's time.

When you write a nov More...

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Nov 19, 2011

Conor rated it:

I had seen the film around 5 years prior to reading the book, so I already knew the main plot. I really thought it was a well written book that was full of suspense. The whole idea and notion behind the book was fantastic and so innovative.

I loved the character of Dr. Ian Malcolm and felt that Crichton stuck to this character's personality really well all throughout the book. If it wasn't for the character of Dr. Malcolm I would of given the book 4 stars, but I felt some of the long More...

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Oct 26, 2011

07connork rated it:

Jurassic Park is one of the best books I personally have ever read. It is the perfect blend of Dinosuars, action, and suspense. Jurassic Park is the story about dinosuar attacks on a Costa Rica island of Isla Numblar, when palentologist Alan Grant is brought to the park by millionare John Hammond. Once Alan gets there he discovers an entire island of Dinosaurs cloned by blood found in fossilised misquitos. Alan and a few other scientists and a lawer are brought to the park to make sure it is s More...

4 comments like

Oct 24, 2011

Emma rated it:

****Spoiler Alert*****

Jurassic Park tells the story of science trying to overpower and contort nature. When an old man with too much money decides that he wants to clone dinosaurs from the past, nothing will get in his way. He purchases an island and begins cloning the beasts from the past. It seems too dangerous to go on, but he refuses to stop, having invested so much money and time into it. A great example of this can be seen through the quote, “Face the damn facts, Henry ... T More...

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Oct 13, 2011

Jonah rated it:

Imagine riding a harmless themepark ride on a tropical island. Now imagine a four-story lizard standing before you, roaring in fury. Think of that lizard tearing after you destroying everything in it's path.
Now which would you prefer: this, or simply dusting off a fossil. I don't know about you, but Alan Grant would be dusting off rocks if it were up to him. But unfortunately, it's not.
Alan Grant is a paleontologist excavating in Montana, and is in the middle of a stunning find. But More...

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