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Timeline was the last book of Crichton's I read. It really turned me off. I had been a fan from a young age, but that was it. He ignored or twisted science, rea
by cdr 18y ago
Timeline was the last book of Crichton's I read. It really turned me off. I had been a fan from a young age, but that was it. He ignored or twisted science, reason, and logic just for "cool" plot points, far more so than in any previous book.
- SapphireSun 18y agoTimeline wasn't about the mechanisms of time travel, it was about the past. He may have gotten some physics wrong, but it was the historical stuff that stuck with me. While I agree that some of his newer stuff wasn't so good, his older stuff really turned me on to certain fields like archeology, physics, nanotechnology etc. My mouth literally dropped open when I saw the headline. I wish his family well. :(
- swilliams 18y agoI enjoyed the first half of Timeline, and like I said, it was my first exposure to the quantum physics presented there. The second half (after everyone was trapped in the past) seemed kind of cliche. I didn't find Prey too interesting though. I'd already known about nanobots and at that point was a professional software developer, so the programming aspect didn't have the same "magical" appeal as the others. Perhaps if you're already familiar with the area he covered, it doesn't hold as much of an appeal?
- SapphireSun 18y agoUndoubtedly. The reason Timeline held (and does hold) such an attraction for me is that it helped me realize that the people in the past weren't stupid or maybe even misguided compared to our current selves. They were just working with different sets of information. A professional historian would not find something like this new at all, so your perspective does matter.