This book picks up a few years after the original Jurassic Park disaster. It turns out that that the rumors of Ian Malcom’s death were greatly exaggerated, and he has recovered thanks to Sarah Harding. While none of the survivors of the Jurassic Park disaster have talked about what happened, there are rumors. And those rumors aren’t helped by the reappearance of weird creatures on the Costa Rica coast. In fact, wealthy scientist Richard Levine has come up with the theory that there is another island with dinosaurs on it, and he is obsessed with finding it. And it isn’t long before he, Ian, Sarah, and others are heading to the second island to study the dinosaurs, learn more about how they lived, and hopefully learn why they became extinct. Will the scientists be able to prove their theories? Or will some stowaways and other uninvited guests ruin their plans?

I listened to an abridgement of this book over 20 years ago, and I remember thinking this was a decent if unnecessary sequel. I decided it was time for a relisten and this time, a listen of the full book. Turns out, I enjoyed the abridgement better. There is too much time spent rediscovering that the dinosaurs are out there again and trying to locate them. Then, once we arrive, we get lectures, mostly from Malcom and Levine, about how dinosaurs lived and theories about why they became extinct. While there are some suspenseful scenes early on, it’s not until the final quarter that we get the scenes the movie has made famous. And those scenes? Nail bitters even if you know what is going to happen. The ending is much better than the movie’s ending as well, not that this is a high bar. Diehard fans will enjoy this one, but the casual fan has no reason to pick this book up.

Read my full review at Carstairs Considers.

Of all the unbelievable things that happen in n  The Lost Worldn, the most unlikely is Malcolm willingly returning to an island full of dinosaurs.

While Crichton shies away from killing off children, he seems to enjoy describing the deaths of adults in full gory detail. If someone's death seems too tame - just fading to black - it means they're still alive, and the actual pain is still to come.

Crichton writes wonderful characters that cover the full spectrum of humanity. Strong, independent women who get the job done under pressure. Antisocial nerds who are so focused on data and research that they don't recognise danger until it's too late. Greedy, money-hungry men who are willing to backstab and murder for profit. And, of course, Malcolm - the man who loves to get injured early and spend the rest of the book in a drug delirium mooning over mathematical theorems.

n   "All your life, other people will try to take your accomplishments away from you. Don't you take it away from yourself." n

I always remember the original Jurassic Park movie as wonderful, the second as pretty dumb, and the third as terrifying. While there isn't a third book in this series, n  The Lost Worldn is definitely more on the terrifying side. A lot of the narrative is consistent with the second movie, with a heavier emphasis on velociraptors - which is what made the third movie so scary. And a lot of what made the second movie pointless (transporting dinosaurs to San Diego?!) isn't present in the book, thankfully.

Overall, this is a pretty perfect series. I know a lot of my goodwill comes from nostalgia and excellent movies, but these books hold up on their own and are definitely worth the read for both people who haven't seen the movies (do these people exist?) and those who love them.

n   "'Human beings are so destructive,' Malcolm said. 'I sometimes think we're a kind of plague, that will scrub the earth clean. We destroy things so well that I sometimes think, maybe that's our function. Maybe every few eons, some animal comes along that kills off the rest of the world, clears the decks, and lets evolution proceed to its next phase.'" n

Review originally posted here on Britt's Book Blurbs.

n  n

nBlog | Bookstagram | Reddit | Twittern

This book blew me away!!! I was so happy when it was SO different from the movie, it made the stakes real because I genuinely didn’t know who would live/die, and what would happen next! The second half of the novel is an adrenaline fueled wild ride of straight badass action, and I got fairly attached to the phenomenal characters. This book was such a fun read, and I HIGHLY recommend for anyone who is a fan of the first. Some amazing ideas lead to a genuinely beautiful and terrifying thought of being stranded in a Lost World!!!

Quando i dinosauri dominavano la terra

Divertente intrattenimento da leggere sotto l'ombrellone.
Persa completamente la profondità contenutistica dell'opera precedente, l'infausto ritorno a Isla Sorna promette frizzanti guazzabugli preistorici con dinosauri esagitati e piuttosto birichini.
Certo, lo svolgimento è piuttosto scolastico e non aiuta l'oramai assente fattore sorpresa (vantaggio di cui il primo libro e relativo adattamento cinematografico hanno goduto).

 Διαβάστε και την ελληνική κριτική στις βιβλιοαλχημείες.

Even though this was a reread I was really surprised that it had nothing to do with the film adaptation other than two main scenes and a few story elements.

Spielberg’s film adaptation was more of a combination of this novel by Crichton, and Arthur Conan Doyle's novel of the same name.

In both Doyle's and Spielberg's film dinosaurs arrive in the mainland by ship.
This doesn't happen in Crichton's book.

Let me make a language style comparison of the two novels and their respective films.

«Jurassic Park»'s similarities with its film adaptation are as similar as Spanish is to Portuguese. An 89% mutual intelligibility.

«The Lost World»'s similarities with its film adaptation are as similar as French to English. A lexical similarity of 27%.

So you can imagine how much different was this book from the film. And of course how much more I enjoyed it, despite the mild reading slump I was in.

I love the movie too (one of the first I watched at a movie theatre) but in this case I prefer the book a bit more.
A tidier and more interesting plot.
Where the film had 20+ characters the book doesn’t have more than 10 in total. And that’s good, because the more the characters the messier is a book for me.
Well, that’s all I had to say, have a nice day.

4.5

I read Jurassic Park in July of 2017 and really enjoyed it, so I have no idea why it took me close to 2 years to get to The Lost World (which I buddy read with my friend Erica!) but I finally got to it, and I loved it even more than the first book! I never watched the movies growing up, so I watched the first movie after reading the first book and now that i've finally read The Lost World I can continue with the movies!

I really enjoy the writing in these novels. I find it easy to read and get lost in, even when the science is thrown in. I find the plots to be pretty believable (as much as bringing dinosaurs back to life can be) and it to have a nice steady pace that slowly rackets up the tension.

I loved Arby, the genius black boy, and Kelly (13 I think? year old girl) and Dr. Sarah Harding! Definitely my favorite characters! I really enjoyed these particular passages too..(possible spoilers..)

"Malcolm Wheezed; his arms around her neck were trembling. He said, "you're very strong."
"But still feminine," she said, grimly." and

"That's very good," Harding said. "I think these people owe you their lives."
"Not really," Kelly said, with a little shrug.
Sarah shot her a look. "All your life, other people will try to take your accomplishments away from you. Don't you take it away from yourself.""

Those sound pretty damn feminist if you ask me!

It had moments of tension, moments of hilarious (like high on morphine Ian), and moments of hell yes!

And the deaths were awesome!

https://linktr.ee/Wickedjr

4.5/5

Novela de aventura-acción del autor de Parque Jurásico. Me sorprendió para bien diferenciándose de la historia contada en la película ya sea de los personajes o de los hechos.

Intercala acontecimientos comparándolos con la adaptación y me gusto mucho la novela ya que parece una historia no tan alejada de la película pero si algo que te cuenta más acerca del trasfondo de los protagonistas y de la forma en que llegan a donde tienen que llegar.

En fin si te gusto la novela anterior o si no viste por ejemplo la adaptación de el mundo perdido te gustará sobremanera ya que tampoco cuenta todo con exactitud lo acontecido en la pelicula llevándote por otros caminos y los personajes se ven con más carisma y personalidad. Muy recomendado.

Es el segundo libro de Parque Jurásico

Los personajes viajan a un nuevo escenario, una nueva isla que fue el verdadero "laboratorio" del parque, donde los dinosaurios eran fabricados por los responsables de una empresa que creó el fallido parque temático.

Una novela apasionante repleta de emoción y aventuras que te hace devorarla con rapidez.

Przecudowna książka. Mniej więcej podobna do drugiego filmu z cyklu jurajskiego, jednak o wiele bardziej naukowa. O wiele lepiej została tutaj przedstawiona postać Sary, która w filmie wydawała mi się głupia i „narwana”, a w książce jest mocną feministyczną postacią. Zreszta tak samo jak Kelly, która w filmie jest córką Malcolma, a tutaj uczennicą Levina i bardzo zdolną matematyczką.

Ogólnie cała książka opiera się teoriach ewolucji samego autora, ale opartych na wielu pracach naukowych wymienionych na końcu książki. Sam Crichton mówi, że są to jedynie jego opinie, jednak poparte są tak rozbudowanymi przemyśleniami, że ja to kupuje. Najbardziej spodobało mi się założenie o tym, że postępująca globalizacja jest przyczyną zahamowania ewolucji gatunku ludzkiego, bo motorem zmian są małe grupy społeczne.

Podsumowując, ja bawiłam się przy niej świetnie, bo dinozaury kocham, Iana Malcolma crushuje, a do tego dostałam masę wypowiedzi skłaniających do refleksji.

I just had to do a re-read. Why? Because of peer pressure.

But is that bad? No! Not at all! Indeed, for a wonderful exposition of science stuff, almost Heinlein-esque adventure mixed with monster-flix ethos, it's just about perfect.

Booooom. Boooom.

Honestly tho, Malcolm is the linchpin of this novel. Without him, I probably wouldn't have cared that much. Everyone else is just overflowing with hubris.

Still a classic. It may not be as good as the first book, but the science was great and so was the action, so I don't really care.

2.5 stars

Me for the first 60% of the book:



I’ve never really liked the second Jurassic Park movie. I changed my mind. There are worse things, like the book the movie was adapted from. I actually applaud the writers, because fixing this mess took talent. Guess it helped ignoring the entire book apart from two or three of the interesting dinosaur scenes.

Overall this was nice to read because Crichton’s writing flows even when Malcolm is in the middle of one of his chaos rants, but man, I was expecting something way better than this.

First things first, I don’t understand why the author went to the trouble of reviving Malcolm if his character wasn’t really needed. During the book he never once mentions his previous trip to Jurassic Park, and he behaves as though he has never been on the other island with Grant and Hammond. He would have never, never, never gone to Isla Sorna to save Levine, whom he doesn’t even like, knowing that he would find the same dangers, just to prove his stupid extinction theory. He’s reckless and acts without thinking, plus he keeps blabbering about his theories even when his life is in danger. I was so confused when his group suddenly decides to go to the tyrannosaur nest to check I don’t even know what, after a guy had just been eaten. Then they bring the baby to the trailer and make him a cast for his broken leg and Malcolm says nothing? They managed to make it work in the movie, but here that was way beyond stupid.
To be honest, this was a trend for all the characters involved. In the end the dinosaur attacks were triggered by idiotic actions more than anything else, but I’m mad at Malcolm in particular, because he freaking KNEW what would happen. Is it too much to ask for character continuity and characters who use their brains? Jeez.

On the other hand, I liked seeing a woman like Sarah take the lead in this kind of book written by a man in the 90s. It’s refreshing and heartwarming. Doc Thorne was also very sweet and caring, and I’m glad he survived. I wouldn’t want to be in his and Levine’s shoes though, because now they have some explaining to do to the children’s parents lol.

Some of the dinosaur scenes were nice and brutal, especially the ones with the tyrannosaurs, but others were purely unrealistic. I wish the raptors weren’t in this book at all. Raptors that eat candy bars, holding them in their forearms? Raptors that find the high hide by sniffing a candy bar wrap? Raptors that run away with keys? Dinosaurs that destroy a car to find their eggs inside closed metal briefcases after hours? I’m sorry, but this is too much. And there’s many more scenes that made me roll my eyes.

This book was one entire discussion about extinction, chaos and other scientific stuff. There was too little action, even the conclusion was rushed so that the characters could tell everyone about their latest realizations. The villains die, the good guys survive. That’s it.
I guess the good thing is that this book made me appreciate the movie in a way I didn’t think was possible after all these years.

I really liked Jurassic Park, but this sequel is terrible. The characters are all one dimensional and the whole book is an obvious ploy for a movie deal, which apparently paid off for the author.

First of all, the characters are all sociopaths. Not a single characters shows any emotion over the death of any other character. Some of them had been working with Eddie for years and yet, when he falls and is immediately killed by raptors, they just move on. They barely even mention the fact that their friend just died. I also noticed that as a "good guy" he got a quick death, yet whenever a "bad guy" gets killed, Crichton dedicates several paragraphs to describing their death in detail.

Dodgson comes across Harding when she's under the Jeep and her friends just tell her to "stay under the truck" and "don't move," but they don't tell her why. She has a headset on, so they can explain what's happening to her without Dodgson hearing at all, but instead Crichton decided the geniuses need to act like morons for the suspense factor. And what was their plan? Just stay there and let Dodgson take the car? They could have at least told her to flip those circuit breakers she just flipped and disable the car again so he couldn't drive off with it. Instead, the more-genius-than-the-other-geniuses Harding decides to fight him off. But then a T-Rex shows up, so instead she decides to kill him. She hasn't told anyone that he tried to kill her so from the watchers perspective, he's still just a jerk and a thief, not a murderer. Her friends just watch her push him to the T-Rex with the only comment being "There is a God." Which may be the only emotion in the entire book shown for a character death. But it turns out he doesn't die there, that happens later in a gross and slow description.

Malcolm knew all about the dinosaurs from the previous book, yet he couldn't talk about them because of an NDA he signed in exchange for paying his hospital bills. First of all, for a genius he sure got himself a pretty bad deal for the trauma he experienced. Secondly, he sticks to that NDA a lot longer than anyone would reasonably expect, since he never once mentions his previous experience in this book. Levine, on the other hand, goes to the island looking for a "lost world" where dinosaurs never died out. Instead he finds a laboratory and evidence that a company was making dinosaurs and he's very suspicious that Malcolm had dealt with them before. But once his suspicions are confirmed, he never says a word. Not once does he turn to Malcolm and say "What's with the lab? Why was someone growing dinosaurs? How did they do it? Why didn't you tell me about this? What's going on?" Nothing. He just gets to the island, sees dinosaurs, and is suddenly an expert on their behavior and only cares about watching them to the detriment of everyone and everything else.

Weights. Has Crichton never dealt with a heavy object before? Half of this book is just the author trying to show how smart he is through forced conversations of pseudo scientific baloney (hallmark of a Crichton book), yet common everyday things he gets wrong.
"a large metal cage came crashing down"
"specs are it can't deform at twelve thousand psi"
"constructed of inch thick titanium alloy bars" (FYI, titanium alloy is heavier than pure titanium.)
"Thorne [...] lifted the cage high and swung it into the back of the Jeep." (didn't even struggle)
Yeah, the book says the cage is light, but it still has to weigh enough, especially with an unconscious 11 year old boy in it, to be pretty tough to just swing around like that. Especially considering it's 4 feet in diameter and 6 feet tall. I assume Thorne is smart enough to design the cage tall enough to stand in, so he must be under 6 feet tall, making this feat even more impressive.
Also, both armored RV trailers hooked together get pushed around by a couple T-Rexs because the combined weight is only 2 tons. These are armored trailers, with electric motors, batteries, solar cells, full of equipment, sleeping quarters, supplies, yet only weigh 2 tons. An electric Mini Cooper weighs 2 tons...

How is it no one knew about the dinosaurs on this island despite the evidence that dozens or possibly hundreds of people lived and worked there? That question is never addressed. The plot was just so lazy.