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Title: Timeline by Michael Crichton, William Roberts ISBN: 0-7531-1103-9 Publisher: ISIS Publishing Pub. Date: 01 February, 2001 Format: Audio CD |
Average Customer Rating: 3.58 (1644 reviews)
Rating: 3
Summary: Terribly entertaining but terribly flawed
Comment: 3 ¼ stars
Several of the reviewers of The Jester recommended Timeline as a much more sophisticated medieval historical/action/fantasy novel and they were right, but to the extent that Crichton was more thorough than Patterson with his historical background, he is guilty of an equivalent degree of logical inconsistencies. This is an entertaining read because of the terrifically interesting theme of going back in time to the middle ages(although I think someone else with the initials MT came up with this idea around 120 years ago). If you keep your expectations moderate, and can appreciate the book's strengths without becoming too disgusted with Crichton's many, many inconsistencies, you should enjoy it.
Pros:
- Crichton really does portray 14th century French-English feudalism with a lot of detail. For instance, he spends a fair amount of time describing the mill, both its structure and fortifications, and the industry going on inside of it, both milling grains and using water power to operate the bellows in a small steel foundry. I appreciated Crichton's thorough bibliography of historical sources.
- The illustrations were nice - why is having some drawings and illustrations in a book considered suitable only for children?
- The plot is fast paced and there is plenty of action.
HOWEVER......... the Cons:
- After going through a number of pages of genuinely scientific-seeming explanation (including diagrams) for how the technology works, likening it in some ways to a fax machine, Crichton drops the ball on the logic. When asked why a person can become reconstituted at the end of the process in another world/another time without having any device on the receiving end to put the person back together (like receiving a fax without a fax machine on the receiving end), he just uses a pretty ridiculous explanation - namely, that some other much more sophisticated civilization in one of the infinite alternate universes must have figured out how to do it, so those advanced folks are being thoughtful enough to make the space/time traveler reappear at the designated place and time in this alternate universe out of the kindness of their hearts - "we don't know why, we just know it works."
- Crichton is emphatic on having his characters state that "this is not actually time travel - it's travel between different universes occurring at different times in the past." That doesn't square with the professor leaving the clues for the crew in the monastery - if it is a different universe rather than the same one, then how could the note and the bifocal lens end up in the real universe? Wouldn't the professor have had to travel back in time in our universe to have left those items?
- How did the professor just "sneak off" into the 14th century world by himself, given that the process requires a lot of coordination between scientists and equipment back in our time?
- What was the deal with the original scientist found lost in the desert? Why did he end up there, rather than anywhere else? This was a significantly loose-ended subplot.
- Would the ITC folks, who have been so incredibly precise and secretive about their work, have really been so careless as to let slip all of their knowledge about the 14th century?
- Isn't it a bit hokey and too-coincidental that one of the main characters just happens to be an expert in all forms of medieval martial arts? Similarly, isn't it a bit coincidental that another character happens to be a rock climbing enthusiast when the only way to escape a dozen or so situations is to use those climbers' skills? In fact, all of their dozens of miraculous escapes go so far overboard that they make a James Bond flick look realistic.
- Why would the experienced ex-Marine security team be caught so thoroughly in the headlights by the knights upon their first arrival?
- How exactly does Donniger think he will profit from historic tourism if the visitors to past times in the alternate universes can't interact with those universes and must essentially remain invisible? If we can't trust our little crew of expert historians and archeologists to refrain from meddling in those universes, how exactly is it that we expect joe-tourist to refrain from interfering with the past?
- How is it that Deckard/De Kore happens to be wearing his little earpiece/communicator (and it still works, too?) on, a full year or more after he left our world?
- How is it that the communicator/translator device incorporates an accurate vocalization of Occitan, a dead medieval French language that no one has spoken for hundreds of years, especially since ITC's visitors have no interactions with 14th century people?.
- Why is there such a focus on the secret passageway into La Roche? If it's so secret, how does anyone know about it? Furthermore, how does the French army follow the protagonists into the castle, given that the secret passage is very long, the only way is down a presumably deep underground river and the protagonists took the only boats?
- The scene near the end with the giant knight at the GREEN CHAPEL OF DEATH??? Come on! Crichton stole that scene straight from Monty Python.
- The lady (forgot her name) who ends up with Andre - sure she's a savvy, ultra-practical opportunist, but even so, her conniving tryst with the knight she more-or-less publicly denounces doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Does she just sleep with every man who has any degree of power in the hopes that she can escape her situation?
- The character Chris - could there be a less realistic, dopey-geeky-nerd-academic caricature/walking (stumbling) stereotype?
- How is it that the professor knew how to make Greek fire or an equivalent? The recipe has been lost for many hundreds of years and even modern scientists cannot duplicate it.
If you are not too put-off by all of the above, you should enjoy Timeline.
Rating: 2
Summary: Good story idea, awful execution.
Comment: As a Michael Crichton fan, I found this book disappointing. The fundamental ideas underlying the plot were good and Crichton takes pains to make the quantum concepts reasonably clear (though in simplifying them he skips over a lot of details that don't quite jell with his plot!). I also found the glimpses of feudal life in the middle ages to be fascinating. For all that however, the plot development never quite takes off and a very large number of situations in the novel seem to be contrived rather than flowing with the storyline. As other reviewers have commented, this is closer to a movie outline than a book and there are contradictions galore. Excusable perhaps from a new author but not from Crichton. Two stars for the initial idea, but that is all.
Rating: 3
Summary: Timeline
Comment: In this action- packed novel, the medieval past is combined with the newest technology of modern day. This fast-paced adventure begins when a man is mysteriously found in the middle of a hot Arizona desert, babbling incessant nonsense. Police authorities and hospital staff are puzzled when the man suddenly dies. Meanwhile, halfway around the world, archaeologists are at a medieval castle site in the beautiful France country-side. All of the workers feel fortunate to have hands-on experience with fascinating history. However, they soon become suspicious of the corporation that funds their research. What exactly are their motives? One of the professors is abruptly taken from France to the headquarters, and then disappears. The archaeologists are all unaware of what is going until they make a shocking find. Soon they too are whisked off to the corporation headquarters in Arizona. The lab there is making amazing discoveries in the world of quantum technology. The corporation, called ITC, found that there are multiple universes and there is a way to travel to those other universes, even those that are in the past. Before they know it, the archaeologists find themselves in medieval France hoping to save the professor, who disappeared into that universe. Before long, they must fight to save their own lives and make it back alive. In order to achieve this, the group of archaeologists goes on a quest to uncover secrets many are vying to learn. Armed only with their expertise and knowledge of the past, they must avoid sharp arrows, trained knights, and ambitious nobility who will stop at nothing to gain power.
Crichton did a wonderful job of combining science with history, and he entertains as he enlightens. However, I found at times quantum technology was not clearly explained, and I was frequently confused. There were a few pieces of Crichton's story that did not fit completely together in my mind. Despite this, the book was a gripping adventure that was hard to put down.
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