Next by Michael Crichton Review
March 6th, 2007 by admin
Released November 28, 2006, this is the latest medical thriller by Crichton. The book focuses on genetics, genetic research, gene therapy, and what happens when humans try to push the limits on genetic engineering.
The book has several plot lines in it (I counted six), which can be hard to follow and keep track of because the book keeps going back and forth among them. Personally, I sometimes have a problem remembering something for five minutes, much less trying to remember where a plot line left off several chapters ago in a book. There are lots of names to remember. I was partway through the book when I stopped reading it for several days. I had to go back and re-read most of what I had already read in order to remember the particulars about all the characters and what plot line they were part of.
The book is fiction, but has many facts in it too. Gene therapy is a real but thorny issue today. Gene patents are a real thing and are something the author would like to see end, which he points out at the end of his book in his “Author’s Note” section (the section has several other things he feels strongly about in regards to genetics and issues related to it).
One of the storylines involves a researcher named Harry Kendall, who did unauthorized combining of chimp and human DNA (his own) and finds out a few years later that his experiment is alive and well. While the research institute the chimp/human is at looks the other way, Harry takes the little guy (named Dave) home because the alternative would be for Dave to be terminated. Harry cannot stomach the thought of that. Dave is human in many ways, and is quite intelligent. As you can imagine though, Harry’s wife doesn’t take the news so well when Harry tries to explain it to her.
Another storyline involves a character named Frank Burnet who finds that his own cells and rights to his body are no longer in his control. His doctor has sold his cancer fighting cells to a research facility for a staggering amount of money. When those cells are contaminated by someone trying to put them out of business, the company decides to go get more cells from Burnet. But he’s not willing to give them up. The company doesn’t care, says it owns them, and that he has no choice as to whether or not his body is violated.
Burnett then goes into hiding so the company decides to take the cells from his daughter Alison, a lawyer in her thirties, or Alison’s son. They hire bounty hunters who show up at Alison’s son’s school and try to temporarily kidnap him to retrieve the cells they need. When Alison shows up at school due to a tip from a teacher and thwarts the plans, the bounty hunters try to snatch her. She gets away and winds up going into hiding with her son in order to not be forced to give up the cells. While she’s in hiding she has other lawyers going to court for her to try and legally prevent the research company from taking those cells from her and her son.
There’s also a very intelligent African grey parrot named Gerard, who adds some levity to the book as he is taken from his home by a husband who hates the bird and winds up in the hands of several different people, most who realize they can’t wait to get rid of him.
In the book, there is a log of medical terminology to read. If you are not interested in that type of thing, it makes for some really boring reading. I also thought there were too many storylines.
My rating (0-10 smilies): 5 ☻☻☻☻☻☺☺☺☺☺