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I did not like this book nearly as much as Jurassic Park. That being said, I liked it a whole lot more than the Lost World movie. It is very different from the movie, which was a positive to me. I don't really like the "whoops, children stowaway!" trope. I did think that the book had very good moments of suspense, and is similar to the first one in that it has enough action and adventure that it will satisfy readers that aren't usually interested in science-fiction. ( )

My rating for Jurassic Park (Jurassic Park #1):
★★★★☆

My rating for The Lost World (Jurassic Park #2):
★★★★☆

WARNING: There are two spoilery bits at the end of this review, but I did place them in a spoiler tag, so don't click if you haven't read and don't want anything potentially spoiled!

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Well, I wasn't expecting this-- but, I am pleasantly surprised. Watching the movie for The Lost World (it is for this book, right?) did nothing in preparing me for what the book The Lost World was going to be about. First of all, who would have known that my wish for more Ian Malcolm would have been granted in tenfold? If there is one thing that these movies definitely still have right, it is Jeff Goldblum.

The Lost World is Michael Crichton's sequel to Jurassic Park and the only other book of his set in this world. Did we really think the dinosaurs were gone (again)?

It has now been six years since the demolition of John Hammond's Jurassic Park, and the incident has at first glance been contained. But could something like this truly be contained? When something is "destroyed" what actually remains? Paleontologist Richard Levine has begun to research the many possible sightings and surrounding legends of supposed remnants from the time of dinosaurs. Levine contacts Malcolm, and a new group forms to go in search of this "lost world."

Most people I have seen reviewing these books much prefer the first installment of this duology. I, however, actually quite enjoyed this one and would say that it is on about equal grounds with Jurassic Park for me. The two books certainly differ from one another in many ways though. I would say the biggest difference actually lies in the fact that there is so much of Ian Malcolm in this one.The Lost World balances out the action and palpable fear of the first book's traumatic dinosaur experience with an attempt at a more removed, scientific approach to the subjects in question. In effect, we get a kind of reversal of the approach in Jurassic Park.

Now that Levine and Malcolm's group feel prepared for what they are about to head into (though let's face it, can you ever really be prepared for DINOSAURS?), they are able to run a little less and observe a little more. As it is pointed out in the story however, an observer cannot be considered fully removed from their environment and therefore will still have some kind of an effect, however minuscule it may be. From the time that humans decided to engineer this extinct species, they became irreversibly entangled with any outcome.

Because Malcolm does what he does best and spews a fairly consistent flow of chaos theory mixed with a newer complexity theory, the prose can be a bit dense in this one in comparison to the first. Still, it is explained in such a way that is usually pretty easy to pick up on.

Besides Malcolm, we get a completely new group of characters in The Lost World. I wasn’t particularly attached to those other characters in Jurassic Park however, so this didn’t bother me. The new characters take up very similar roles as those in the first book anyways—they are just more rounded out and interesting in this instance. Shout-out to new character Sarah Harding for being a total bad-ass though! Harding is definitely the best addition, showing her mettle as she both rescues the entire group on multiple occasions and lends the needed inspiration for young Kelly.

Even with the switch to a more scientific approach, there are still plenty of scenes of dinosaurs both hunting down the humans and the humans chasing after the dinosaurs. There is still a good sense of suspense throughout, and mostly all the pieces are able to connect together. The only thing I am left wondering about at the moment is whatever happened to the dinosaurs being dependent on a lysine diet from the first book? I am fairly sure that Malcolm new about this and yet it was never mentioned. I kept thinking it would have some big factor to play in the consideration of how these dinosaurs couldn’t be studied as comparisons to the original species.

On a similar note, Malcolm also never mentions anything about the splicing of dino DNA with related modern day species to fill in the gaps. I’m pretty sure this also should have been an important consideration in their study, especially with Malcolm being so concerned about how behavior is linked with extinction. It was made clear in Jurassic Park that some of the dinos were exhibiting some behaviors both not anticipated and at the same time similar to those species they had been combined with. Wouldn’t this cause them to be wary from the beginning of using this “lost world” as a comparison to the original species? But perhaps I missed something along the way that explained these two details. Or perhaps I just don’t know enough about the proposed science and these factors don’t actually matter in this instance. Either way, I am not going to get too bogged down about it.

All together I give The Lost World a 4/5 stars.
★★★★☆ ( )

Up front, I will say that I've seen the Jurassic Park movies (original 3) many, many times, so if you're looking for an unbiased opinion, you may want to go elsewhere. Jurassic Park is one of my top 3 favorite movie franchises, if not the top. I did read this book once, back in high school, most likely because of how much I already liked the first couple of movies then. However, unlike the first book, which I couldn't help but compare to the movie as I read, this one is so different from the movie that very early on, I had to try to push the movie out of my mind. And in doing that, I am probably able to review it more for itself than based on my love of the movies. Though I can't pretend that love didn't still possibly make me enjoy this more than I might have otherwise.

I didn't love this book quite as much as the first, but I did enjoy it, and it kept my attention throughout. Malcolm's arrogance and loquaciousness takes a back seat to a new character, Richard Levine, though we do get almost a repeat of an injured, drugged Malcolm rambling on that also happened in the previous book. I don't know why Crichton insists on putting kids in harms way in these books, but I did like the kids in this one more than the two in the first book (it was mostly Lex that was annoying in the first book). One of my biggest frustrations while reading is probably fair enough for Crichton to have included, but it frustrates me to have an intelligent character say that evolution may not tell the entire story of existence up to now, that there may be more that modern scientists haven't uncovered, yet without a doubt, creationism is just wrong. To be so absolutely sure that one model is wrong, though there is plenty to confirm it, even while saying we may not know all the answers smacks of willful ignorance. Sadly, this is absolutely the world we live in.

Though, as I said, I didn't compare the book to the movie as much this time around, one thing that I realized is that Sarah Harding is quite the strong, courageous woman. She's mostly portrayed that way in the movie too, but I don't understand why the movie makers decided to flip the script when the trailers are being pushed over the side of the cliff. In the book, Sarah does the saving, while in the movie, she has to be saved by Malcolm. I'm not a feminist, but that seems fairly deliberate to me. Though, I suppose, it could have just been more about giving Jeff Goldblum the save than anything to do with gender roles. Overall, I do think that fans of the first book and/or the movie franchise will enjoy this book. ( )

https://tamaranth.blogspot.com/2023/06/2023079-lost-world-michael-crichton.html ( )