Prey

Rating:
Summary: My favorite Book ever!
Review: My grandma gave this to me Thanksgiving 2003, and I was skeptical because I had never read a Chrichton book before. Well, I started reading it and I was quickly lured in this thrilling story of a Tech firm gone mad. The character of Jack is easily appealing and his suspicions of his wife makes a great double-plot story. And remember: things never turn out the way you think they will...

Rating:
Summary: "Prey" this never becomes a movie...
Review: Prey is your typical Crichton novel High on the scale of tension. And as with most of his books, it'll probably give me some frightening (or at least incredibly creepy) nightmares for a few nights. If you liked Sphere (the novel- no one liked the movie) this one will meet or surpass your expectations.
Unfortunately, it is slightly crippled by the first person perspective. In hindsight I can see why this approach was taken, but...
My other minor qualm, it seemed too easy to figure out what was going on. Now, I don't pride my logistic skills. My problem-solving abilities leave something to be desired. However, I was a step ahead of the main character almost the entire book. But maybe I'm just starting to know Crichton's writing style a little too well.
As with Timeline, the ending makes you look back and notice more than a few plot holes as well as raise nagging questions, in a story that had, until that point, been airtight. The unneccessary commentary on the last paragraph gives you that queasy Outer Limits/Twilight Zone kinda feeling.
I enjoyed the book and think every Crichton fan should give it a try. Just don't expect too much.

Rating:
Summary: If a 10 part recipe, this was 9 parts research and......
Review: ......1 part writing. Crichton has been my favorite author ever since Andromeda. Sphere, Rising Sun, Disclosure - all brilliant. He started losing me with Lost World, which was Disney-kid fluff. In this one, his science extrapolation is excellent and classic Crichton. However, the writing was dreadful. "I did this, then I did that." Some authors use first person as a crutch; here it is a fully powered wheelchair. I lost track of how many times Jack tells us there is no way out and he'll be dead in seconds. And he tells us this so matter-of-factly that you expect Jerry Seinfeld to show up and say, "Ah, that's a shame." And what do writers do when they can't portray the intended angst? They use exclamation points; ug. The characters are painfully stock, and the dialogue is B-movie. The most dynamic relationship is clearly between Jack and Julia, but the lack of pre-crisis Julia character development made me not care about the denouement.

Rating:
Summary: save your money
Review: I'll keep this review really simple and to the point: I found this book to be far fetched and just plain silly.Save your money!!!

Rating:
Summary: Tense and Exciting
Review: Michael Crichton is a master of limited disaster stories. Small areas and small casts combined with high tension and sometimes the possibility of greater impact. Such is the case with this one.

An out of work programmer begins to suspect that his wife is having an affair. But at the same time other strange things begin to happen at home. As the questions about his wife's behavior begin to become to much, he is offered a job straightening out a programming problem at his wife's firm.

The problem concerns nonotecnology and using microscopic robots for imaging. Some of the nanobots are loose and not responding to controls. Their fail-safes seem to be inoperative. The devices are evolving and they are dangerous.

The story encompasses about a week with most of the action happening in a single day. Like Jurassic Park, the story is told from an after-the-fact perspective so some of the tension can't quite build. There are a few unanswered questions that seem like the answers were edited from the final draft (i.e. the black cloaks) but it still reads well.

All in all, if you enjoyed Jurassic Park, The Andromeda Strain, Twister, or other similar Crichton stories, you will be hooked on this book.

Rating:
Summary: Crichton's best since "Rising Sun"
Review: I was a little disappointed with Michael Crichton after reading "Timeline", but this book makes up for it. "Prey" is an intense story that is interesting because it brings up questions that will inevitable emerge with the new nanotechnology. The story was good, but I think Crichton's story-telling was a little more flawed in this story than we are used to. "Prey" is told from the point of view of a first-person narrator. I have never been a fan of the first-person narrator, unless the voice is unique, like that of Ishmael in "Moby Dick", I think Crichton's story would have been more credible if told from the point of view of a third-person narrator. First-person narration is also awkward when describing existing conditions in the past tense. Also, it takes away from the tension in the story because it is obvious that the main character is going to live because he was alive to tell the story. Crichton also makes a few type-o's that I got hung up on. He used "tinny" for "tiny" twice, and he said Julia was "diseased" instead of "deceased", which confused me. My only other complaint with the novel is I would have liked to see Jack describe how he felt emotionally at the end, after the tragedy he faces (you know what I mean if you read the book), the story seemed to be lacking in that aspect. Overall, this book was very exciting and suspensful, especially the last 100 pages. It is engrossing and, as usual for Crichton, full of technical details introduced in a way that makes it pretty easy for the casual reader to follow.

Rating:
Summary: An Outstanding Book!! One of Michael Crichton's Very Best!!
Review: Of all the books in the world to pick up Prey would have to, at this time, be the most wonderful read. It was very suspenseful and from the ending, right when they get stuck in the cars outside and must make it back to the lab, the book is non-stop intense, suspenseful, thrilling action. It becomes irrisistable. I find it amazing how it goes from starting with Jack at a grocery store buying placemats to him fighting nanotechnology with scientists.

Prey, as I said, starts off at a grocery store where the main character, Jack Forman, a stay-at-home dad caring for his children, is buying placemats for the house. It goes on to tell how Jack begins suspecting an illicit affair arrising from his perculiarly acting wife Julia. When Julia gets into a car accident and is taken to the hospital, Jack decides it's time to find out what's going on at her super hush-hush "fab-lab" called Xymos in the Nevada Dessert. Upon arrival it seems that everyone is very uptight and worried and there are only a few people led by Jack's friend who is acting very odd.

Within the first day of arrival Jack is notified that the lab tried building nanorobots as spy cameras for the army. When they escaped it was a hurry to find and collect these robots...they failed, and now they want Jack to help them to better understand these creations which are multiplying and getting much more dangerous by the hour. Soon they are extremely technologically advanced yet if the people succeed is for you to read, and leads to the books amazing and climactic ending.

This book wins me over on all fronts. It was extremely well written and somehow manages to be extremely suspenseful and thrilling. What the people decide is sometimes so out of the blue and so crazy that you can't believe they went through with it, but that is the beauty of this novel which keeps you riveted from nearly beginning to end. Each new time zone/time frame of the novel delivers something new to worry about and gives you a nice boost in your knowledge of technology and the worlds evolution. Most people I know of that read it (which accounts for twelve people) love it and have already read it twice. I'm now buying this book to own and read as many times as I want. You'll fall in love with all the screams and suspense and thrills it delivers, and boy oh boy does Prey deliver.

5 out of 5 stars. One of Michael Crichton's Very Best and second only to Jurassic Park. It is on my top five Best Books Ever List as number four. Outstanding. A read well worth it.

Rating:
Summary: Good story - scary theme
Review: Here we see the "old" Crichton again. He wrote a novel full of suspense after having done his homework in research very well. Over the last twenty years or so the topos of the magician's apprentice who uses his wand without considering the possible - and often disastrous - results of his doings has become a classic in modern stories. And this happens frequently when corporations are too profit-orientated to analyse implicit future dangers that may result from their new technological projects and when they accept possible dangers for the lives of people - or on a larger scale the destruction of mankind. Logically the novel's ending is ambiguous. It is the reader's choice whether he wants to be an optimist or a pessimist in these issues.

The characters - above all the narrator Jack - are well constructed to help the development of the novel and the understanding of a rather complex subject. There are minor flaws in the story's plot, though. Some twists in the action are not really logical. Why is Jack called in to help when he is a potential danger for those who call him? Why does his wife not kiss him at the beginning of the novel? OK, OK, it would have been a completely different story. But a plot has to be logical after all.
Nevertheless I have enjoyed reading the book, I liked the story and I can recommend it to all those who are interested in modern technology and its possible dangers.

Rating:
Summary: It's Crap
Review: Well, maybe not crap, but its nothing spectacular, either. Once again Michael Crichton brings to life a story that he once could have written so much better. Little tiny robots have been invented, and theyre smart. And they can learn. And adapt. And...do things that youd only expect in a horrible John Saul book. For the last 50 pages I kept expecting the alien's spaceship to come out of the clouds and end it all. Not that this book was about aliens (at all), but it had that crappy sci-fi feel to it.

I've no doubt that nanotechnology could become dangerous if used carelessly, but the scenarios Crichton imagines border on the ridiculous. This is the kind of book you buy at an airport, and when youre finished you leave it on the plane so the next person can have it. In some cases people do this to share a good book with a perfect stranger; in this case youre doing it 'cause its just not worth carrying around. 'Prey' will pass the time, no more, no less.

Rating:
Summary: Quite Mediocre
Review: I only purchased it because I was in downtown Phoenix for a conference and couldn't find a real book store within walking distance. I was stuck with the hotel's W.H. Smith and the NY Times bestseller list (blech.)

This book is a fast, pleasant read. The early portions were quite promising, evoking a feeling of creeping doom. I also liked the sprinkles of social commentary, particularly the discrimination fathers face in custody proceeedings.

However, the plot quickly became utterly -- and I mean utterly -- predictable. The only suspense left for me was seeing just how long it would take the main character to figure out what I had figured out, and details of the resolution. The last portions degenerate to a long "beat the unstoppable monster" sequence.

Might make a good movie on the Sci-Fi channel.

Save your money. Or, use it to buy Charles Pellegrino's "Dust".