Il mio primo Chricton, un tuffo nella fantascienza degli anni 70 che forse una volta faceva tanto scalpore e che oggi invece sembra un po’ tirata. Comunque un racconto molto facile da leggere, nonostante il finale non mi abbia entusiasmata più di tanto.

The Terminal Man is an insight into the seedling
technologies of the 70s the allow much of the medical technologies that we have seen reach fruition today. It is well researched and delves into the psychology of the time pretty well.

It is simply written and fast paced, but if you’re after deep emotional attachment to characters, this isn’t for you.

I can’t tell if Michael Crichton is a raging misogynist and homophobe or if he is just characterising his narration to fit the scene and decade of time that he’s trying to portray, but the social components of this really don’t age well. If he were still alive, I probably my would have rated this down further out of principle for his homophobic words and throwing around the term “retard” more freely than anybody should. But he’s not around to receive my punishment, so I’ll leave it at 3.5 Stars.

This is not a work of art (nor does it claim to be) and they drink so much of that horrible American percolated coffee, but if you’re after something easy and fast that any reader could easily start and finish on a flight from London to Sydney, this is for you.

A Michael Crichton book I never got around to when I binged him as a youth. I’m happy to report that his patented brand of informed but not slavishly bound to reality techno-thrill is present and accounted for, even if the end result is not quite as polished as many of his later works. Looking forward to filling more of my MC gaps, as well as rereading some old favourites.

A reread of a book I haven't read in almost 15 years. I'd forgotten most of the details, but now after finishing it I feel pretty unsettled. The book was written in 1971, and the detailed infodumps on the medical technology of the time (typical of Crichton) as well as the prevailing social norms (casual treatment of misogyny and sexual harassment, homophobia, etc) are clear indicators that this is definitely not my time period. As a reader, I'm tempted to label this as "historical" and felt like an observer trapped in a bad time-travel police procedural with a psychotic lobotomy patient as the villian. The poor, beleaguered psychiatrist MC should have jumped books and landed in a nicer medical drama or romantic thriller where she'd be surrounded by more competent people and not blithering idiots masquerading as doctors.

This is Crichton’s 12th novel, but the second writing under his own name rather a pseudonym. This is also one of his more famous novels, not least because of the film version that came out in 1974, although it was less successful than the novel. The premise: Harry Benson is a computer scientist who suffers from "psychomotor epilepsy", which causes him to have seizures in which he becomes dangerously violent and later has no memory of what he did. Doctors at the Neuro-Psychiatric Service (NPS) of University Hospital have a solution: implant computerized electrodes in his brain to control the seizures.

This being a Crichton novel, this does not go well for a number of reasons, starting with the fact that Benson is also psychotic and believes that machines are already taking over humanity. Benson’s psychiatrist, Janet Ross, warns the two doctors performing the operation – John Ellis and Robert Morris – that the procedure will only control the seizures, not cure them, and that this won’t make him less psychotic because that’s unrelated to his epilepsy. Ellis and Morris realize this, but do it anyway. You can more or less guess what happens next.

Like most Crichton novels, it’s a page turner, even when he throws a lot of infodumps and tangents into the narrative, especially as he ruminates on the ethics of well-intentioned mind control, the relationship between man and machine and what happens when machines can outthink us – which is both interesting (to me) and strikingly relevant given the current conversations we’re having about AI and metaverses and whatnot. On the downside, Crichton also throws in a lot of subplots as backstory for the principal characters that go nowhere and don’t add any useful information. And of course, you can see the ending coming a mile away. It’s okay for what it is, but there are other Crichton books I would recommend. (Also, I hear it was Crichton’s least favorite of his works, so there’s that.)

it felt rushed and it ended quickly. but overall the concept was entertaining.

Really fades into nothingness but there’s something there early on

Been on my nightstand for almost 10 months. Had only 50 pages left if you can believe it. Wrapped it up so that I can start the new year fresh.

Not my favorite Crichton but the pacing was quite good.

This book is about a man who suffers seizures and blackouts. When this disorder occurs he has bursts of violence that he does not recall. He undergoes an operation that attaches a small computer to his brain. This computer will induce happy thoughts when one of these seizures is about to happen.

This is one of the author's early works and the reader can tell as the writing is not refined like his most popular works. This is his version of Frankenstein as once again we see how humankind plays with science to create a monster. Even though this was written many years ago it still has implications today as we rely on computers in the medical field more and more. There were some aspects that did feel a little dated like the portrayal of women in the medical field or how every one smokes in every area of the hospital.

This is a very quick read as this book is less than three hundred pages. I would classify this book as a medical thriller mixed with sci-fi. There was interesting concepts like humans getting in over their heads. I also liked the portrayal of the patient being like a lab rat before surgery. This book was an enjoyable read but it never enraptured me like some of his other works.

It was bad. The concept had potential, so I gave it a second star, but the book was just bad. It was not well written, the characters were not well built. It had it’s moments, when I thought things were finally getting interesting or when a new subplot was introduced but they all led to nothing. The end was extremely random and anticlimactic. This book made me realize why some people consider sci-fi to be a bad genre. It had all of the worst, stereotyped sci-fi tropes. The author referred to it as his worst novel and I’d like to take it a step further and say one of the worst books I’ve read. Don’t bother wasting your time on it.

Like many of Crichton's novels, this book is a fantastic time capsule of retrofuturism. However, its characters are underdeveloped and the plot is not particularly convincing. Worth a read, but clearly not as good as some of Crichton's other books.

Quite an excellent story, Crichton, once again, kept me on the edge of my seat throughout the whole book. The only reason why I don't give this book the 5 stars is because the ending leaves you on the edge, there are some unanswered questions that I am still curious about. I am hoping that the film has an ending that will help me out with some closure.

That being said, The Terminal Man is an excellent story, ahead of its time and very relevant right now.

I recommend it to anyone who likes speculative fiction, tales of human and/vs machine, stories that will make you look at all the machines/technology around you and make you want to go live in the forest for a while...