I enjoy reading Mr. Crichton's work. He is an excellent story teller, but this book seemed rushed. He started off with a really good idea: Space ship from the future (American) found enbedding in a reef at the bottom of the ocean. No one was inside except for this sphere. Where did it come from? What does it do? Did it kill the crew? Where did the ship come from? Etc Very intriguing! Then it stopped. The concept concerning what the Sphere could do and how they fought against it was lame. It read as if Mr. Crichton had to hurry up and beat a deadline so he just wrote it and finished.