Congo by Michael Crichton Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Congo
Book Review: Great story
Summary: 5 Stars
As an Anthroplogy student I have a particular fondness to this book. I love the story and the action is intense. The book is lengthy but you will finish it in a few sittings, it's that good!Book Review: Great!!!
Summary: 5 Stars
I've only read one crichton book but this is byfar the best book ive read in my life.Book Review: Hard to swallow
Summary: 3 Stars
The character and plot development are reasonable, but Crichton is unable to pull it all together in the end. The idea that they actually found what they were looking for, but suddenly it was beyond human reach forever? Come on! There are 5 mile deep gold mines in South Africa. How is 700 feet of basalt and ash going to stop progress? By the way, the rift volcanics are the wrong kind for diamonds - they are more likely to destroy the diamonds with their high heat flow than create them. The book, for all its references, is loaded with technical flaws, not the least of which is the description of the solar flare, where the view of it somehow miraculously precedes its effects. Got news for you Michael - ALL light travels at the same speed.
With all the amazingly coincidences, (700 year old lost city discovered, then lost forever immediately, solar flare of the century, volcanic eruption of the century, revolution, and new specie of gorilla) one would think some effort might be made to tie all these events together. But these events are merely waded through by the protagonists without any analysis via their 256K computer.
I'm amazed Tarzan or Godzilla didn't show up.
Anyway, good action in the middle. Disappointed in the end.
Book Review: In the jungle, the mighty jungle the lion sleeps tonight....
Summary: 3 Stars
the gorillas are a different story.
This 1980 thriller from Michael Crichton (ANDROMEDA STRAIN, JURASSIC PARK) draws on the author's background in anthropology. A company that uses high tech methods of research is seeking diamonds in Zaire. When they lose contact with their on site team under very mysterious circumstances a second team is hastily assmebled in an effort to beat a rival organization to the site. This second team is lead by a untried young woman whose expertise is the technology, an experienced jungle guide with a shady past, an anthropologist and Amy, a young gorilla. So why include an anthropologist and a gorilla in a geological survey? The previous team was sending their daily report via satellite uplink when suddenly communication was disrupted, the last image on broadcast was a closeup of a gorilla peering into the camera.
As is typical of Crichton novels there is a lot of science involved leading to many long passages laying the groundword for the reader. These do not make for exciting reading but Crichton more than makes up for that in the action scenes as the team races from Houston to Tangier then across Africa to Zaire in search of a lost city on the slopes of a volcano. The characters are rather one-dimensional, Amy is the most fully realized. The plot is a bit thin, and rather predictable. The predictablity is due in part to the observations of what various characters would say about the events later, thereby revealing who would survive the events.
This is not one of Crichton's best but it is still a good read, if the reader is willing to overlook a few holes in the plot and just go along for the ride. As is often the case with Crichton's work the reader will be left wonder where fact leaves off and fantasy begins. There is a bibliography at the end which will give the reader a starting place for a little research. Also the cutting edge technology described is now rather obviously thirty years out of date.
Book Review: Interesting Read
Summary: 4 Stars
Congo was the fourth Crichton book I've read (Rising Sun, Timeline, Disclosure) and although an interesting read I felt that the excitement level at the end of the novel (i.e. the last 100 pages) was lacking. The detail of primate studyies a found to be very captivating but I put the book down after the last page hoping for something more. However, all in all this was a good book and should serve as a nice, quick read.