The Lost World (1995)

I'm ever so glad I decided to give Crichton's "dinosaur books" a try. I read Jurassic Park last year, mostly because I thought a dinosaur thriller would be fun, and was really surprised by how much science and philosophy he worked into the plot. I'm a lover of science, and I was quite happy to see that the book was more than just dinosaurs killing stuff. Fortunately, The Lost World is much the same, only this time focusing more on the complexity of life and theories of extinction over the chaos theory and behavioral sciences of the previous book. Not that there isn't plenty of fictional dinosaur behavioral anomalies here as well, though.

To summarize briefly, without spoiling the first book, there are dinosaurs loose on a secluded island, a dinosaur nut goes to observe them and then needs to be rescued by few new-to-the-series characters and Ian Malcom, the only returning character from the previous book. Ian and his monologues are as awesome as ever, of course, and made all the more wonderful by my inability not to picture him as Jeff Goldblum. This character is probably the main reason why I enjoyed these novels as much as I did.

I think the major pitfall of the novel is how slow it is in the beginning. The reader, having read Jurassic Park already, knows that there are dinosaurs about, but they are forced to watch yet another cast of character struggle with the concept of living, breathing prehistoric creatures. It's a common mistake, it seems, and it makes much of the beginning of the novel drag a bit.

Nevertheless, I really enjoyed The Lost World and will undoubtedly continue to explore Michael Crichton's bibliography. ( )

A really great Novel ever! What a pure pleasure reading it, a great concept, perfect thrilling features. ( )

When I read about the section of evolution, I was sitting outside. Once again it dawned on me how amazing life and earth is, how fascinating it were that I was there, the threes, the birds, the flowers. It was fascinating to think about my world, and how it had been in the past, how cool it was that it had evolved to the present.

The book itself was interesting, but not as good as the first book. The lessons/presentations of theories, dinosaurs and evolution I find very interesting, but the story itself was kinda meh. The book has good dialogue and I like how strong and capable Sarah is written. And Malcolm's a wonderful character. ( )

The way I remember it, I enjoyed the book and then wondered what the heck happened when they made the movie. The two had absolutely nothing to do with each other. ( )

Cool JURASSIC PARK follow-up with surprisingly heavy themes of extinction and scientific failure. Crichton clearly rushed this to cash in on the fame of the original, but it's still highly entertaining.