All you Crichton fans...beware. He has jumped the track. There is little or no plot...very poor timing and unlikable superficial characters. He fills the pages with paragraph after paragraph of propaganda, lecturing and sermonizing. He creates characters just to preach his view of the world. This is a cheap trick, Michael. Shame on you. I understand you have a point of view, but don't put this out as a work of fiction. This is an opinion piece and disguising it as a novel is a poor way to pay back your loyal fans. I had to wade through page after page of your agenda to get to the story...and it really wasn't worth it once I got there. You lost your way.