Here is yet another novel made into a movie and my first from Michael Crichton. I become more and more surprised at how Hollywood takes extreme artistic licensing in transforming the book to the movie. Situations are similar, most of the cast are the same, but there are distinct differences between the movie and the book that greatly make a difference in interpreting.

Plot:
Norman Johnson, a psychologist, is hauled to the middle of the Pacific Ocean to preside over a supposed plane crash. What he learns is that he is actually a part of a mission to explore a crashed spaceship hiding underwater for around 300 years and this mission is based on a report he gave to the secretary of the United States on contacting Unknown Life Forms.
Norman, along with Ted Fielding, astrophysicist, Beth Halpern, zoologist, Harry Adams, mathematician, Harold Barnes, USN Captain, and four other Navy personal travel down to a deepsea underwater habitat to investigate this spaceship. Inside the ship resides a sphere. Quickly things turn downhill as the sphere unleashes its alien power.

Good:
I think the book is much clearer about what is happening than the movie was. There are not as many confusing, unexplained occurences. Of course, this is in part due to the inability to show as much in a movie as in a book, but part of it is the fault of the movie.
Further, Michael Crichton is great at his characters. It is nice that Norman is a normal human being, scared out of his wits, making stupid mistakes, and not some young, hunky, smart aleky guy. The people in this book are just that: people. Not supermodels or fakes. Real live people.
Also, the whole idea is absolutely original. Instead of meeting aliens who may or may not be friendly, the team meets an empty spaceship with an alien object in it.
Crichton steadily builds the tempo of this novel. He starts out somewhat slow almost lazy, but it gets more and more intriguing the further you get into the book. By the last 100 pages, I had a hard time putting it down.

Bad:
While not as confusing as the movie, it is difficult to tell which manifestations originated from which person. Did Norman manifest the jellyfish or Harry? Was Beth's seduction Norman's or Beth's? Other than this, there is not much to lament about (other than one of my favorite characters dies...)

Dialogue/Sexual Situations/Violence:
There is quite a bit of foul language, mostly da**, he**, bi***, and God's name. Beth acts seductive to Norman at one point. Over the course of the novel, six people die. Their deaths are somewhat graphic but not overly. Several people try or talk about killing each other.

Overall:
An immensely intriguing book and an enjoyable ride to the bottom of the sea. Well worth the money I spent for it. After reading this book, I definitely want to check out more of Michael Crichton's.