Timeline is another wonderwork by that best selling juggernaut Michael Crichton. It�s not like his books, or films, are really all that good or anything. And although everyone knows that, they still go for it; every time. At least I do. I feel like Crichton has put a weird spell over his readers; the writing isn�t intelligent, the characters are often two dimensional, and the action is contrived or clich�d. But man, is it ever clever. In fact I would hazard to say that Crichton is one of the cleverest populist writers working today. Timeline is a good example of this unstoppable wit.
The story in itself, is rather mundane. A company in Nevada, ITC, has developed a way of travelling through time, well sort of. Anyhow, a clever time travel story might be really quite entertaining; unfortunately the title to this book is quite misleading. This is not a story about time travel. It is a story of romping through Medieval France. Five graduate students and their professor manage to get themselves trapped back in time, and hilarity ensues. No just kidding, this story isn�t very funny. What this story actually is, is predictable. Oh I�m not talking about the specifics of plot, I think what I�m really talking about is Michael Crichton�s style. This book isn�t bad and it definitely isn�t good, it�s just Crichton. We don�t read him to learn, we don�t read him to grow. Most of the time, he really isn�t very exciting even. We just read him because he is Michael Crichton. Don�t bother with this book unless you absolutely are compelled to do so. However I really don�t blame anyone for feeling that compulsion.
Rating:
