Micro

Written by Michael Crichton

Narrated by John Bedford Lloyd

In the vein of JURASSIC PARK, this high concept thriller follows a group of graduate students lured to Hawaii to work for a mysterious biotech company--only to find themselves physically transformed and cast out into the rainforest, with nothing but their scientific expertise and wits to protect them.
IN JURASSIC PARK, HE CREAtED A tERRIFYING NEW WORLD.NOW, IN MICRO, MICHAEL CRICHtON REVEALS A UNIVERSE tOO SMALL tO SEE AND tOO DANGEROUS tO IGNORE.IN A LOCKED HONOLULU OFFICE BUILDING, three men are found dead with no sign of struggle except for the ultrafine, razor-sharp cuts covering their bodies. the only clue left behind is a tiny bladed robot, nearly invisible to the human eye.IN tHE LUSH FOREStS OF OAHU, groundbreaking technology has ushered in a revolutionary era of biological prospecting. trillions of microorganisms, tens of thousands of bacteria species, are being discovered; they are feeding a search for priceless drugs and applications on a scale beyond anything previously imagined.IN CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSEttS, seven graduate students at the forefront of their fields are recruited by a pioneering microbiology start-up. Nanigen Microtechnologies dispatches the group to a mysterious lab in Hawaii, where they are promised access to tools that will open a whole new scientific frontier.BUt ONCE IN tHE OAHU RAIN FORESt, the scientists are thrust into a hostile wilderness that reveals profound and surprising dangers at every turn. Armed only with their knowledge of the natural world, they find themselves prey to a technology of radical and unbridled power. to survive, they must harness the inherent forces of nature itself.AN INStANt CLASSIC, MICRO pits nature against technology in vintage Crichton fashion. Completed by visionary science writer Richard Preston, this boundary-pushing thriller melds scientific fact with pulse-pounding fiction to create yet another masterpiece of sophisticated, cutting-edge entertainment.

• Language: English
• Publisher: HarperAudio
• Release date: Sep 24, 2019
• ISBN: 9781460793428

Michael Crichton

Michael Crichton (1942-2008) was the author of the ground-breaking novels The Great Train Robbery, Jurassic Park, Disclosure, Prey, State of Fear and Next, among many others. Crichton’s books have sold more than 200 million copies worldwide, have been translated into thirty-eight languages, and provided the basis for thirteen feature films. Also known as a filmmaker and creator of ER, he remains the only writer to have a number one book, movie, and TV show in the same year.

Reviews for Micro

[Special Agent Fox Mulder · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Nice idea that somehow fell short with character development! A kind of cross between Timeline and Prey without the relevant 'Crichtonisms'. Character motivations and actions were dysfunctional in a compelling concept.

[nonfictionfan · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Regardless of my username, I do enjoy the occasional fiction book. I tend to rate books by how often I look at what page I'm on, similar to someone looking at their watch while watching a film. I think I was past page 100 before I took a look...sign of a good book. Being a Crichton fan in the first place also helps. :-)

[marklacy-355086 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Sorry I wasted money on this. I had hoped for something original. Miniaturization of people? That's at least as old as "Fantastic Voyage" from the 1960s! Not to mention, "Honey, I Shrunk the Kids" etc. I was willing to overlook writing that wasn't that great if the ideas were stimulating. No such luck. Gave up on it.

[bxwretlind · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

It took too long to get into this book and there were far too many stereotypes with regard to Hawaiian culture. I did rather enjoy the descriptions of the micro world like many other Crichton books, however Preston was not a good choice to complete it.

[kevincannon1968 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I've read most of Crichton's novels and this is probably the worst. The plot seems to lurch from one badly thought out set-piece to another. Whilst the original idea for miniturisation is a great one, the scientific principles behind it are too easily fudged and seem to be bent to fit the plot points rather than have a well crafted plot that fits the science.The main protaganists are characterless and unlikeable with far too little character development and you early on get the impression they are just filling the 'Star Trek Landing Party' members you haven't seen before prior to being bumped off earl in the episode - sadly some of these last far to long into the novel.Even the main character is not fleshed out enough to make you bat an eyelid when he is killed off halfway through. The villian is equally badly characterized and by the time I got to the end I really didn't care who was the victor.To its credit I did finish it and I'm reading that it will shortly be made in to a movie but as most of Michael's books are better than the resulting movies I'm not adding it to my must-see list

[mattwa33186 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Not really written by Crichton, finished after his death by Richard Preston.

You can see the skeleton of a Michael Crichton novel here, which is what Preston started with. But what he constructed around that skeleton is one of the most godawful stories I can remember reading.

Characters don't develop over time, they undergo complete personality changes between paragraphs. Some are clearly caricatures of people we met in previous Crichton novels.

The main plot point is straight out of the 1960's Batman TV series - "I'll do something incredibly complicated and by no means sure to work, then leave them alone and hope they die!"

The world would be a better place, and Crichton's legacy would be much shinier, if this book had never been published.

[karencollyer · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Some great stories from Michael Crichton. I always think that this is my favourite ... until I read one of the others! I love them all.

[shack70-958873 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Not the best Michael Crichton book I ever read...

[deltaqueen50 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Micro by Michael Crichton and Richard Preston is a techno-thriller that relies on an all too familiar theme of a greedy capitalist exploiting a technological breakthrough that could benefit humanity. In this story, a shrinking machine and mini-robots are being used for evil instead of for good and anyone who gets in the way ends up murdered.When a group of visiting grad students stumble on the truth, they are shrunk down to tiny beings and left in the Hawaiian wilderness to die. As the 7 shrunken characters battle giant beetles, wasps and spiders, one can’t help but be reminded of the Walt Disney movie, “Honey, I Shrunk the Kids”. Of course as the story progresses, they are a number of grisly deaths each one progressively more horrifying than the last one.I understand this this was an unfinished novel of Crichton’s that was completed by Richard Preston and unfortunately this combination of nature against technology doesn’t really work. A story of this nature needs to embrace it’s silliness and so should have had more humour and a lighter touch. I did enjoy some of the survival aspects of the story but the villain was an over-the-top cartoon, the science was ridiculous and the plot felt rehashed from previous books.

[angelajmaher · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I was taken aback when I first started reading this; it had a distinctly unfinished feel to it. Then I discovered the book had been incomplete at the time of the author's death and was finished by another author. I suspect as much of the original material was conserved as possible, but it's resulted in sections of stilted dialogue, characters that at times are more caricatures, repetition, and areas where the pacing is out.Either it improved in later parts of the book or I got used to it. The book is good enough to keep you interested, full of action and twists. If the author had lived to polish the story himself, it would have been an excellent book. As it stands, it has its faults, but its a good tale, and still better than a lot of books out there. The science has been well researched too, which is always good to see.If the plot appeals, stick with reading the book.

[ginafava · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Excellent premise by master crafter Crichton, sophomoric execution by another. Crichton is dearly missed.

[delightedlibrarian · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Reading it now... too many flashbacks to "Honey I shrunk the kids". And at least so far the villin is too 1 dimensional.

I finally stopped about halfway through... Interesting idea, way to melodramatic. Actually now that I really think about it once the only character I liked was killed, I decided to stop reading. I finished by reading the summary on Wikipedia.

[benkline · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Sadly for what might have been Crichton's last (pre-posthumous mostly finished) work, I feel I'm being generous giving this 3 stars. Its not a HORRIBLE book by any means.... but basically if you've read any of his previous works, you could foresee where this was going.

Also, if you've seen any formulaic Hollywood action movie.... you know exactly how this pans out. Nothing really to throw out there, other than technology and different insects at you.

I think the only "loop" that is thrown is the survivors of the students who get shrunken down. As an opposite to this, it was pretty obvious that Eric was never really dead.

It was a decently fun romp, that, apparently took me roughly a year to finish. Didn't quite realize I let this shelf so long and gone back to read other books. This was pretty much just a typical action book that was set in the "micro" world, and because of that, it allowed Crichton/Preston to use insects almost like aliens, where throwing out a different random bug to attack or a bird, or Vin Drake who was mustache-twirling evil, just to try and throw "curveballs out of nowhere" at the protagonists. But sadly it was all too pretty much straight forward and formulaic.

[brucemmoyer · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Three stars for a book from a talented author who knows how to tell a story, but in this case he has put together a ridiculous premise which his excellent writing can only go so far to ameliorate the story. Jurassic Park, while fantastic, was believable and so was the Andromeda Strain. MICRO is not. Once you start with a silly premise, even the best writer, and I believe Crichton falls into that category for sheer escapism, will find it hard to put together a cogent story. Yes, there were some interesting events portrayed skillfully by the author, but to make them at all palatable, you had to swallow the premise, which I found difficult to do. Three stars for the writer, zero stars for this book

[carl_alves_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

In Micro, an evil nanotechnology company with its dastardly and malevolent CEO, Tim Drake, are killing off employees. They go on a recruiting mission to lure the young minds of the future into their evil clutches, when one of the scientists’ brother, Eric Jansen, who is an executive of with this company, goes missing and warns his brother not to come to the island. This leads to Drake shrinking the young scientists to a half inch in size and forcing them to fend for their lives in the wilds of Hawaii. Drake is hunting them down, which shouldn’t be difficult given their small stature. They have to use their scientific know how and resourcefulness to survive ants, bees, spiders, and other miniature predators.At the heart of this novel, it’s a solid adventure story. If you can get past some of the sketchy science behind the nanotechnology and being able to shrink people, there’s some cool scenarios that the scientists have to overcome. There are, however, some flaws in the novel. One is characterization. Tim Drake is a bit cliché and over the top. Even the young scientists needed a bit of work, as they often come off as very winy and annoying, especially the character Danny, who I couldn’t wait until he got killed off. The writing itself is very flawed. There is way too much viewpoint jumping and dialogue that leaves a bit to be desired. In the end, I think this is a readable novel that can be enjoyable provided that you lower your expectations first.Carl Alves – author of Reconquest: Mother Earth

[guide2_1 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

So many bad or unbelievable ideas, that I could not make it past the first half of the book.

[mhanover10 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

No matter what anyone else says, I enjoyed this book. As I was reading it I felt like it could be a movie. It makes you wonder, are there people out there creating the equipment to shrink people, can you really survive out in the world that small and are there really crawly things that small in the dirt? Yikes. I thought it was an enjoyable read.

[petrichor8 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Preston did a great job of finishing what Crighton started. I could definitely see this going to the big screen

[bauernfeind · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Well, I've got to say it was sort of bizarre. I thought at first it was a children's book - and I was close to stopping but was intrigued by the story line.

[bravenewbks · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This read like miax of Agatha Christie's Ten Little Indians (aka And Then There Were None) and the old movie Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. No, seriously. Gory and fantastical and fun.

[szbrooks1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The writing was done well, but it lost me in some places .

[utbw42 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Wow, a nice surprise. Crichton's last book that I read, Next, to me, was an absolute turd. I threw caution to the wind and gave this a try, as I have read a couple of Richard Preston books in the past and enjoyed them. The result of this combined effort produced an imaginative, tight, page-turning thriller. What would YOU do if you were shrunk down to 1/2" height and plopped down in the middle of a tropical rain forest? I only wish Crichton were still alive to produce more stuff like this.

[ague_3 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Micro has some good up to date science in it. It would also make an excellent movie.

[cahallmxj · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Title: Micro: Inner space in the jungle.Story:A mysterious company, Nanigen, is making some of it's investors nervous with rumors about it's unstable and ruthless CEO. A local private investigator is hired to see what he can find out about what is going on inside the company and if there is any truth to the rumors that the company CEO may be up to no good. The PI gains access to the companies building but doesn't find anything at all really, or so he thinks. A few days later the PI, his boss, and another man are found dead in a office that was locked from the inside. They look like they were attacked with a knife or some kind of blade, but no weapon is found.Meanwhile Peter Jansen receives a visit from his brother, Eric, who is ready to reveal the company he has been working for. It turns out that Nanigen is hiring and he wants to know if Peter would like to come out to Hawaii and listen to what the company has to say. He also extends the offer to Peter's coworkers. They all agree to go out and begin to make preparations for the trip.Right before Peters is leaves he is informed that his brother has vanished in a boating accident and that a company representative will be waiting for him when he arrives. This is after he receives a strange text from his brother which simply reads “Don't Come”. Worried and confused Peter heads out to Nanigen to see if he can find out what happened to his brother. After he arrives his concerns are confirmed when he finds that his brother may have been “hushed” up in order to hide some of Nanigens secrets. Peter decides to take matters into his own hands and bring Nanigen to justice. What he didn't count on was that the CEO of Nanigne would go to any legnths to make sure that his secrets would only go to the highest bidder. That includes making sure that his “little” problem stays that way._*_I found this book interesting. It was completed after Crichton's death by Richard Preston. I figured this would be a good read since I like Preston's stories as well. For the most part the story does work overall. It just seemed to me that it was easy to tell what Crichtion had actually written and what was basically filled in from an outline of the story that he was going to write. This also happens with the characters as a few of them seem to be a list of personality traits that were checked off so that the story could keep going. Kind of like the beginning, middle, and end of the story were written but he never got to go back and fill in all the details that would have made the characters “gel” with the story better. Overall I liked the book, in some parts the story really moves and in other parts it seems like Preston may have been told to just go with what materials he had and not alter the story too much, just make sure that it still made sense. There is one big twist that I did not see coming, but beyond that this book is really just by the numbers. Give it a read if you like Crichton or if you are looking for a decent adventure with a few Science Fiction elements thrown in. m.a.c

[jsopcich-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I was optimistic that this could be as good as 100% Crichton, but I was wrong. The story was hard to believe and had no depth of character.

[atdcross · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I'm a bit disappointed in this book. I've read a few by Crichton and he usually keeps a sense of the credible and high suspense. This one, for me, had neither.Michael Chrichton had the knack of making the incredible credible. He fails to do so in thei book.A nano-technology company is seeking to recruit seven university students in the fireld of microbiology. However, when being shown around the company and what is involved in their research, the students are thrust into a a hostile world all to familiar and all too new; a dangerous world where the students find themselves in a life and death struggle against the forces of a nature they themselves have intensively studied but never dreamed of knowing by first-hand experience.It sounds great but the movement but as you read on, the characters seem remote and, in comparison to Crichton's other books, lacks high suspense. I was actually surprised and disappointed as to the main plot as it seemed an unlikely idea to come out of Crichton and too fanciful. There is an unexpected turn and a couple of characters are interesting, especially Karen King, but it does not help the story overall.I must add that, unfortunately, Crichton died before the book was finished and Richard Preston took over. To the latter's credit, there is no discernible difference, at least, to me of any change in style; however, wherever he started, his writing added nothing to improve the story.

[colinf.barnes · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Interesting concept let down by shonky prose, flat cliched characters and a plot that often broke the suspension of disbelief. Some of the botany and insect science was interesting, but the awful, unlikeable characters had me cheering inside as each one was eaten or butchered by the natural world. Fun in parts, but dull to read in others. Needed much better copy-editing in my humble opinion. Large parts felt rushed and the prose was so basic and repitious in parts that I felt this was aimed at 10 year olds.

[lovestampmom · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This book deserves a 3.5 stars. As I said, as a long time Crichton fan, I probably came equipped with an overly high expectation. The book started out slow, with lots of loose ends that needed to be tied together, but came together nicely at around 30%. Without giving too much away, I'd have to say Crichton's high-tech, breakthrough technology is here, as well as the thrill factor, so the book is a page-turner. The general idea of the plot was good, and the story could be easily adapted into a movie like all his other books.

What I did not like about the book, is that the characters, especially the few graduate students, blur together a bit in the beginning. I had a hard time telling them apart, and I had no idea who the main characters were, until the very end; since once I developed the liking and understanding of one, she or he gets killed off. The villain is a bit too unrealistic and inhuman.

Preston was good in given reliable and descriptive scientific facts throughout the book...but weak in story telling and character development. I was quite surprised about this since his non-fictions, "The Hot Zone", and "Demon in the Freezer" read almost like a great fictional story. However, for readers who thrive on facts, you would learn a lot about insects, plants, as well as toxins in this story. Overall, it was an enjoyable read, and I think all Crichton fans should read it, but wait for the price drop first.

[john257hopper · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is the second of Crichton's posthumous novels, published as having been co-written by him and Robert Preston. It isn't clear exactly how much of this novel Crichton completed before he died, but it was clearly the bulk of it, and this has all the hallmarks of a Crichton techno-thriller, misuse of science and technology by corrupt individuals and corporations, etc, entirely unlike his other posthumous novel, Pirate Latitudes (which felt more Bernard Cornwell than Michael Crichton). There are fewer characters in this one than in some of the others and it felt the better for it, and one got to know some of them quite well (Vin Drake is one of the most chilling fictional creations in any of his novels). In fact this posthumous book, while not in the Andromeda Strain/Sphere/Jurassic Park league, was for me definitely one of the highlights of his latter period.

[lbm007 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

This likely would have been a decent book, if only Michael Crichton had finished it. Instead it's got a Crichton-like idea of a story, filled out with unbelievable characters, stilted dialogue, and ridiculous little twists and turns. Not a good representation of Crichton's abilities as a storyteller at all; hopefully he's not turning over in the grave to have his name on this.