It was always a mystery to me, how someone could write the Jurassic Park, which I felt was more of a movie material than a novel, with all it's action sequences, gripping chase scenes and the nail-biting suspense. My opinions seem to lose meaning after this read.
No wonder his books are best-sellers. It's not the narrative style, which is really good but nothing exceptional there. It's not the characters, they remind you of those holly-wood action flicks' characters, a bit clichéd yet enjoyable .
It's the plot that stands out; the sheer enormousness of it is enough to make even a good author falter. But Crichton saunters through this intricate science fiction plot, knowing fully well that his readers include laymen and hence the intertwining of technical narrative with the actual story. It's like watching a sci-fi movie, only you get to acquaint yourself with the science involved in a more comfortable manner, with an adept author who is magnanimous in expounding the terms as we encounter them in the plot. The style was a bit similar to Dan Brown, but the matter is more interesting than mere history and symbols and Jesus.