Airframe
by Michael Crichton
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Book Reviews of Airframe
Book Review: Scared of Flying? This Book Actually Helps.
Summary: 4 Stars
Airframe was recommended to me by a friend, and this friend suggested I wait to read it until I was in the airport awaiting my flight. Since I am moderately afraid of flying, I thought that reading an airplane-disaster novel as I was starting a flight would be a bad idea, but did so anyway. As I turned that pages, however, I found myself less and less worried about the flight, as I was reading not a airline horror story, but a technical thriller about aircraft(frame) design, corporate and union politics, and the state of investigative reporting, ala 1996.
Not much has seemingly changed in the latter two topics over the last 15 years, as television news continues to deliver bit or bite-sized glances at stories that have the best visual aids, and unions continue to clash with private businesses over concerns of job fairness and availability. However, I was very surprised to learn about the detail that Crichton was delivering on the airplanes themselves, and of the safety procedures that kept the designs in check. I left the book feeling much more confident about my flight than I started.
Crichton delivers all of the detail necessary to convey the importance of every small, relevant part on the aircraft, and does so without leaving the reader behind. I never had to worry about new acronyms or terms, as Crichton would blessedly explain them to me in short order. This readiness to make clear the technical, along with the fast pace and short chapters made Airframe a quick read. At the end, I felt both smarter and safer about the concept of shooting through the air in a metal frame (at least in the US), and experienced an excellent thriller about the search for truth that follows a disastrous airline incident. Recommended.
Book Review: An interesting, informational and exciting work.
Summary: 5 Stars
I find "Airframe" is a very interesting book, at least enough for the reader to finish it. Crichton, as in all his novels, did a lot of research. Despite this, I found many aspects in this novel tiring, specially the fact that there are too many technical details that almost dwarf the main story -of course they don't get to do it-. The characters (you can count over three thousand), except, maybe Casey Singleton, aren't sufficiently developed and at times they become essentially boring cartoons, because Crichton employs too much time in his techno babble. Not that the facts about the airplanes are so boring, but sometimes they take over the plot, slowing down its rythm. Anyway, I enjoyed this novel very much because it presents a chain of very exciting coincidences and events (Crichton succesfully keeps our attention making real life a lot more interesting), so many of them, that sometimes they can get exhausting. What I definitely liked the most was that the book makes a solid critic at modern life aspects such as sensationalistic media and industry management corruption. Like his "Lost World", at the end it makes us wonder: What's this world turning into?, because we realize that honesty and search for the truth -what Casey defends as an honorable person, even when it could cost her job- are just forgotten principles and all that rules powerful people's minds is search for money and more power. Happily, Casey triumphs at the end, but actually because of her luck, as her neighbor makes her see, "You were stupid. You should have lied" he tells her, and we think next time she will have no other choice. A great novel from a great writer. I can't wait till the movie!
Book Review: Unbelievable
Summary: 2 Stars
In "Airframe", Michael Crichton did an unbelievable work. I mean, nobody that has ever read his previous books can believe this one comes from the same mind of "Sphere" and "Jurasic park". By the way, his new books are so passable that his old ones are gettin the public and midia's attention. "Sphere" and "Eaters of the dead" are being or have already been taken into movies. After great "Rising Sun" and "Jurasic...", Crichton couldn't keep the pace. "Lost world" is very numbing and "Airframe" is tottaly waste of time and patience. The main plot of the book is, however, good: what could have happened to TransPacific flight, leaving several people injured and some dead? Crichton carries de reader through the hangars of a frame-making company on the edge of bankruptcy, which must solve the mistery quickly so not to loose a big deal that could make money flow on the registers again. There're so many characters in the plot that even the main one is took aside. Another problem are the infinite number of CCAs, WWCFs and FDAs that take away the good mood from everyone. And when the whole mistery is solved, the accident's motive is so imbecil that you want to throw the book in the fire and watch if it burns. The writing is boring. The will to leave the book alone is huge, but the reader keeps it in his hands, remembering the money invested in the book and thinking that afterall this is a Crichton book, there must be some kind of surprise at the end. Believe this reviewer, there isn't.Book Review: This book was far out ! It was so cool ! My friend Agrees!
Summary: 5 Stars
My friend Agrees! Yeah! He's so cool to read that book too. It was a very thoughtful, smart, interesting, and very exciting book. Very very very excellent airplanes! I love airplanes now! I want to go in a plane! This book was very interesting. It was also very smart in both its implications and suggestions and also in its scientific implications. I loved it so much!I would say that there are some few parts of profanity though, unfortunately. That is quite unfortunate. But I really don't mind an authors ability to express himself. There is a certain genre of people that really want to be thrilled, not preached about what not and what to say. I really have no idea what I'm saying. I'll cut the rant.
Get the book. Don't get the book. I loved the book. The book rocks. Facts are facts. It is an awesome book. The planes rock. What more is there to say! I really don't know!
One thousand words is very generous Amazon.com! I love it though. Amazon.com is great to have these reviews and all the people can write about the books. That is very good. Well, I think I want to wrap this up. Overall, the Airframe story runs along, shall we say, very choppily yet very tasty to the mouth, mind, and to the soul. What I mean is that is lingers in the body even after you read it. Even after the mind understands, the hands and the feet understand. I don't know what I mean, and I know this might have no absolute relevance in this world. But I believe this is a truly exciting, fun, scary!, book. Michael Crichton did a great job. Let us congratulate him and Amazon.com at the same time!
Sincerely, Adel
Book Review: The best Crichton's ever written
Summary: 5 Stars
This is absolutely my favourite book by Michael Crichton. He may have a medical degree, but he writes about journalism, the media and politics with much more insight than the condescending attitudes of his scientist characters. This book is Crichton at his best--backed up, as ever, by extensive research into the topic, a cast of hugely realistic characters to love and love to hate, and, of course, an intriguing mystery thrown in to boot. Casey Singleton is a classic Crichton heroine--world-weary, wise, and an expert in her field, she reminds me of Sarah Harding from "The Lost World", except Casey has a REAL job. The realism of the plot is one of the main factors in making this one of Crichton's best books--all of this could really happen. I've seen other reviewers bellyache about the mundaneness of the final solution to the aircrash, but isn't that the most chilling note to the whole plot? Just how easily all this chaos was caused? Sleazy journalists, wise colleagues, a comical team of experts called in to exammine the aircraft, and at the centre of it all Casey Singleton, trying to save the company and at the same time trying to stop herself becoming the scapegoat to be sacrificed to the media: for me, this makes a brilliant novel. The final pages will blur by--and when you sit back with a sigh of relief, the underplayed conclusion to this book behind you, there is the final message: Don't believe everything you read in the papers. Well, I said it was realistically underplayed, didn't I?