A review by wade117
The Lost World by Michael Crichton

adventurous tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.0

I was eager to read this novel for two reasons. The first, this is reportedly Crichton’s only sequel novel he ever wrote. The second, I wanted to compare Crichton’s sequel to Spielberg’s version. Unfortunately, it seems the book follows the same trajectory as the films. 

The story takes place five years after the events of Jurassic Park. Site B, another island off the coast of Costa Rica, was used as a dinosaur engineering ground, but has since been abandoned by the defunct InGen corporation. The remaining dinosaurs have been left to roam the island free for the last five years, creating a lost world. 

Though many of the sames themes from Jurassic Park are carried over, Crichton presents a couple of new ones. Ian Malcom’s character proposes the concept of complex systems naturally gravitating towards the boundary between chaos and order. This boundary serves as the optimal, though precarious, location for the thriving of complex systems. Too much order and the system freezes, unable to adapt. Too much chaos and the system will collapse from instability. Both of the children characters, Kelly and Arby, as well as the island itself, serve to represent this idea. Kelly represents the chaotic element while Arby represents the order element. Together, they work effectively as a team. The dinosaurs on the island were unable to thrive while under the control of InGen. Given sudden and complete freedom, the dinosaur communities began to devolve as exemplified by the velociraptor population. Interestingly, and much like the science critique from Jurassic Park, this chaos and order idea is also explored in Jordan B. Peterson’s Maps of Meaning. 

Additionally, Crichton explores the driving forces behind evolution and the cause of the extinction of dinosaurs. Ian Malcom’s character proposes the idea that behavioral adaption serves as an explanation for the faster-than-expected rate of evolution and also a possible cause of mass extinction events. In a complex and inter-related system, such as an ecosystem, changes in behavioral adaption can cause ripple effects throughout the biome. These effects could potentially cause the types of mass extinction events seen in the past. Crichton takes the idea further by postulating that recent changes in human behavior may end up being a cause of the extinction of our species. This is a particularly interesting idea considering today’s steady decline in birth rates across most of the western world.

Though the plot provided for some exciting action sequences, I felt the book suffered from a lack of interesting characters. Ian Malcom, the only returning character from Jurassic Park, provides scientific and philosophical narration, yet he doesn’t provide the other characters with unique insight to the situation, survival advice, or any other practical knowledge from his experience in Jurassic Park. Ian behaves almost as if Jurassic Park had never happened. That brings us to Sarah Harding’s character, initially introduced as a romantic interest of Malcom, she starts out interestingly enough as an African predator field researcher but is then flatlined as a Mary Sue. She very nearly becomes a deus ex machina character, who not only saves all the other characters on multiple occasions, she performs near superhuman feats of strength to do so, all while providing regular criticisms of her male colleagues. Needless to say, the teased romance storyline is abandoned. Maybe this well-worn trope was more compelling in 1995. 

In summary, while this book made for a fun action-adventure, it was underdeveloped with uninteresting characters and a rushed ending leaving many story lines unresolved. Why was this sequel written? I can only guess it was simply a reaction to the success of Spielberg’s Jurassic Park adaptation.