Timeline by Michael Crichton Review
Knopf, November 1999.Hardcover, 444 pages.
ISBN: 0679444815.
Ordering information:
Amazon.com.
As he has done in many of his prior novels,
Crichton has again used new
technology to create a powerful
story. This time he uses
quantum technology and about it
he writes, "Quantum technology
flatly contradicts our common sense
ideas of how the world works. It
posits a world where computers
operate without being turned on and
objects are found without looking for them.
An unimaginably powerful computer
can be built from a single molecule.
Information moves instantly between
two points, without wires or networks.
Distant objects are examined without
any contact. Computers do their
calculations in other universes. And
teleportation is ordinary and used in many
different ways." This quote is from Crichton's
introduction; scientists have already
learned this much about the strange quantum world,
but they know little about how to manipulate
it. Crichton greatly expands upon these strange features
of the quantum worlds to help make the
concept of time travel believable.
In his latest novel,
a group of historians and grad students
are working on the re-creation
of a medieval castle and town in France,
commissioned by ITC, a company run by billionaire
Robert Doniger, a brilliant, but
somewhat deranged physicist.
The research group assumes it is a
typical research grant until they are called in on
a special mission -- to return to the actual
time they are studying to help find their
friend and colleague, Professor Johnston, who
is lost in that world. Their travels are
beset by violent knights, warlords
and other dangers. The world of
medieval France is not a peaceful one.
It has frequent battles, thievery, sword
fights, rape, disease
and random acts of violence.
The group must rely on what
know about this world through their
observations of it centuries in the
future in order to survive the ordeal and rescue the professor.
Michael Crichton, who has penned some of the best-known titles of the 90's including Jurassic Park, Congo, Disclosure, Airframe and Rising Sun, has written another appealing action-thriller that evokes the chilling consequences of a possible future technology. Crichton also does an amazing job of recreating the feudal lifestyle of 14th century France as a time of great violence. His recreation of the weapons, armor, fights, people and lifestyle of this time period is fascinating. Timeline is a very visual and fast-moving novel that is sure to please Crichton fans.
Return to the February 2000 issue of The IWJ.
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