by John Carruthers

Created on: April 30, 2009   Last Updated: May 04, 2009

When Michael Crichton died at the end of 2008, I was very sad to hear about the passing of someone who I didn't necessarily consider to be one of my favourite authors, but was always an engaging read. I always feel a little guilty when I think about the death of someone famous in such a context - i.e. how it affects me as opposed to how his family must be feeling. But I guess that is human nature.

Anyway, even sadder than his passing is the fact that the final novel published before his death was Next. I read the book and thought it was okay, but it never really sat right with me. I don't think it was up to his normal standard. I have always set the bar quite high for Michael Crichton.

I always make the joke that if you took all the technobabble out of a Michael Crichton book, then you're left with a short story. And Next is no different. But before I always loved how things went a little over my head and forced me to try and think about what was being written about. I found myself almost switching off at such points in Next, something I never thought I would find myself doing.

To me there was no real central theme, it all seemed like a group of loose interconnections. Maybe I was missing something (which is quite likely), but there just wasn't enough to grasp and keep hold of for me. Don't get me wrong, there were some interesting points brought across but it seemed sometimes to be more like a dissertation on genetics and DNA manipulation rather than a story.

His books are always very well researched and when I discovered what the book was about, I expected to be very interested in what he has to say. I felt a little let down by it all in the end, though. This is maybe the one Michael Crichton book that I would not consider reading again.

Basically, it is a book about genetic manipulation and the greed of multinational corporations. To try and give you any more information about it would involve being better versed in a plot that was not quite there.

Which is a terrible shame because it sounds so interesting when you read the above paragraph. In Michael Crichton's hands, this should have ranked amongst one of his best. I don't want to speculate that he already knew he was dying whilst writing this and it maybe took his mind off his writing, but something definitely wasn't right.

So, with that in mind, I reckon the only saving grace is that he was apparently working on two more books at the time of his death, one of which was completed and will be released at the end of this year, and another that needs another author to finish. So maybe Michael Crichton's career still has the potential to end on a high.

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