*Review* Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton

 Genre: Science Fiction

Published: November 20, 1990

Pages: 466

An astonishing technique for recovering and cloning dinosaur DNA has been discovered. Now humankind’s most thrilling fantasies have come true. Creatures extinct for eons roam Jurassic Park with their awesome presence and profound mystery, and all the world can visit them—for a price.
 
Until something goes wrong. . . .
 
In Jurassic Park, Michael Crichton taps all his mesmerizing talent and scientific brilliance to create his most electrifying technothriller.

This was the January selection for my Books and Booze book club. This is my honest review. 

As an adult, I make an effort to read the book before I watch a movie based on one, but I was like 10 when the first Jurassic Park movie came out (and only 6 when the book released), so I've seen it several times and this is my first time reading the book. That means I actually had very clear pictures of the major characters in my head while reading, which is not something I usually get because I don't see a movie in my head when I read. It's just words for me. It also means I probably won't be able to not compare the book and the movie to an extent in this review. 

Obviously the book has more in it than the movie, including a whole lot of straight science talk, maybe pseudo-science talk: I'm not a scientist so I don't really know if the science Crichton used here actually works. While it has been several years since I last watched the movie, from what I remember, it stayed pretty true to the book overall. Although I appreciate how in the movie Ellie Sattler played a more prominent badass chick role than she had in the book. But in both instances, she's a grad student in her early 20s, so the book depiction is probably more realistic. 

The book also got to delve more into Nedry's motivations and I appreciated that. Like he still definitely deserved to die for what he did and the carnage that resulted, but if he'd been able to pull off his heist without the resulting deaths, good for him. We also saw more behind the scenes Hammond, and that totally changed my perception of him. In the movie I feel like he's kind of just a rich, lovable idiot, in the book I was really hoping he'd die. 

Overall I give Jurassic Park 4.0749 out of 5 stars. - Katie 

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