# Crichton's "Timeline": Another Jurassic Park?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crichtons-timeline-another-jurassic-park/169656>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [April 19, 2003, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crichtons-timeline-another-jurassic-park/169656 "2003-04-19T17:16:39Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\
**Post date:** [May 13, 2003, 12:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crichtons-timeline-another-jurassic-park/169656/41 "2003-05-13T12:04:16Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> I actually like Crichton, specially his expositions. I find that his books entertain as well as educate.

So do a lot of books by science fiction authors, and they do it a lot better, as far as I’m concerned. Crichton lost me very early on (back in 1969), when he devoted too much time trying to impress us with the binary system back in **The Andromeda Strain**. I hated **Congo** , where it was pretty obvious that he hadn’t even _tried_ to make his background plausible (he bragged about this afterwards). Somehow or other Crichton has managed to dazzle the non-genre-reading public into buying his books while they won’t even look at the stuff labeled “science fiction”. But give me Larry Niven or Arthur C. Clarke or L. Sprague de Camp or Hal Clement or any of a few dozen authors before you give me MC.

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**Author:** ![dantheman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dantheman/32/9421_2.png) [@dantheman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dantheman)\
**Post date:** [May 13, 2003, 12:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crichtons-timeline-another-jurassic-park/169656/42 "2003-05-13T12:06:16Z")

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Cal, did he brag about not even **trying** to make the background plausible, or did he brag that he had, in his mind, indeed made it so?

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**Author:** ![Trion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ccd318/32.png) [@Trion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trion)\
**Post date:** [May 13, 2003, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/crichtons-timeline-another-jurassic-park/169656/43 "2003-05-13T12:39:37Z")

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I read **Timeline** to the end in the hopes that things would be explained in a manner that made sense. That’s what kept my interest. And it’s what bugged me all the way through. And beyond.

While I’m at it.

Trion’s capsuel review of **Prey** :

“Eh.”

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