My reading journey started in Mrs. Henning's classroom on the day I needed an SSR (Sustained Silent Reading) book. And I didn't have one. Desperate to just have a book, I took one of Mrs. Henning's recommendations, Prey. Prey, written by Michael Crichton, is a novel about a dangerous scientific advancement that allows a group of scientists to create a swarm of nanoparticles that can work together in knowledgable ways and learn from their environments. At first it seems as if this breakthrough will benefit society for years to come, but the nano swarm quickly learns too much. So much, that it gains the ability to take over a human body, which it does. Throughout the book, people related to Jack, the main character, start to act weird. It isn't until the end of the book, almost, that Jack discovers that the swarms had taken possession of everyone at the lab, with the exception of Jack and Mae.
One of the many things that I love about this book is that Crichton gives the reader a handful of seemingly useless knowledge in the beginning. But, in the end, Crichton's characters use all that information to overcome there problems. Specifically, there is a part where Jack is put into a magnetic field generator (which was put into the facility to boost nanoparticle production should they need it), while his coworkers/friends were under the control of the swarm. It's important to note that the E Coli that they were using to make the nanoparticles had developed a resistance to production, an antidote for the nanoparticles. And Jack had gathered an entire bottle of this antidote, which he planned to put into the sprinkler system (this plan would only work if the alarm was set off and the sprinklers started to spray the antidote upon the infected scientists). This previously mentioned magnetic field generator has the ability to produce a magnetic field 1,000,000 times the strength of the Earth's. This field is so strong that it only has the ability to be pulsed because it would rip apart the entire facility and possibly the world. Throughout the novel, this generator seemingly has no purpose until Jack is thrown into it and it's turned on. The head scientist, Ricky, uses this generator as an interrogation method in order to find the location of the antidote, with the threat of over-pulsing the generator, which would then collapse upon him. Just as Jack is about to die, he remembers that there's an emergency shut-off switch inside the generator, as a safety feature. He switches this lever in hopes of it turning off the generator, but it doesn't work. Ricky had planned ahead and turned this feature off. Jack then pleads to Ricky, saying that he'll only confess to his wife, Julia, who also works at the company. Once Julia comes into the generator with him, Jack quickly turns the generator on and all the nanoparticles that covered her body flew into the middle of the generator, and Jack could talk to his wife. His real wife.
However, once this happened, Julia's skin appeared to be paler and she was much weaker, with shortness of breath. For me, this visual will be in my mind for a long time. It also reminded me of the end of StarWars: Episode VI when Darth Vader's mask is taken of by Luke Skywalker and the lurid face behind Vader's mask is unveiled. His face is pale and uncanny looking. He has become so acculturated to wearing his mask that he'd forgotten how to live without it. And, without it, he died. This correlates very closely to Julia when the swarm was taken off of her. She couldn't live without it and she would have died had the swarm not continually come back to her.
One of the many things that I love about this book is that Crichton gives the reader a handful of seemingly useless knowledge in the beginning. But, in the end, Crichton's characters use all that information to overcome there problems. Specifically, there is a part where Jack is put into a magnetic field generator (which was put into the facility to boost nanoparticle production should they need it), while his coworkers/friends were under the control of the swarm. It's important to note that the E Coli that they were using to make the nanoparticles had developed a resistance to production, an antidote for the nanoparticles. And Jack had gathered an entire bottle of this antidote, which he planned to put into the sprinkler system (this plan would only work if the alarm was set off and the sprinklers started to spray the antidote upon the infected scientists). This previously mentioned magnetic field generator has the ability to produce a magnetic field 1,000,000 times the strength of the Earth's. This field is so strong that it only has the ability to be pulsed because it would rip apart the entire facility and possibly the world. Throughout the novel, this generator seemingly has no purpose until Jack is thrown into it and it's turned on. The head scientist, Ricky, uses this generator as an interrogation method in order to find the location of the antidote, with the threat of over-pulsing the generator, which would then collapse upon him. Just as Jack is about to die, he remembers that there's an emergency shut-off switch inside the generator, as a safety feature. He switches this lever in hopes of it turning off the generator, but it doesn't work. Ricky had planned ahead and turned this feature off. Jack then pleads to Ricky, saying that he'll only confess to his wife, Julia, who also works at the company. Once Julia comes into the generator with him, Jack quickly turns the generator on and all the nanoparticles that covered her body flew into the middle of the generator, and Jack could talk to his wife. His real wife.
However, once this happened, Julia's skin appeared to be paler and she was much weaker, with shortness of breath. For me, this visual will be in my mind for a long time. It also reminded me of the end of StarWars: Episode VI when Darth Vader's mask is taken of by Luke Skywalker and the lurid face behind Vader's mask is unveiled. His face is pale and uncanny looking. He has become so acculturated to wearing his mask that he'd forgotten how to live without it. And, without it, he died. This correlates very closely to Julia when the swarm was taken off of her. She couldn't live without it and she would have died had the swarm not continually come back to her.
Some questions that I would like to discuss with someone who has read Prey are as follows:
- In the beginning of Prey, Crichton inserts several quote from notable scientists on the future of technology. Also, he has a long "prologue" explaining the significance of Artificial Evolution in the Twenty-first Century. Why did Crichton decide to include these details?
- Is Crichton himself afraid of the future of technology? Does he fear the monsters he writes about?
- Crichton graduated from Harvard with an MD in Medicine. Is the scientific influence in his writing a biproduct of his studies or has he always had a love of nature?
- Crichton introduces many different topics/ideas in his books, which all come together in the end. Is this style of writing effective or does it confuse the reader?
- Crichton admits to writing books in a two days time while he was at Harvard studying medicine. These books, although written under a pseudonym, won multiple awards and brought in thousands of dollars. Why did Crichton continue to write under pseudonyms?