Michael Crichton's First Novel Still Resonates Today...

“Increasing vision is increasingly expensive” R.A. Janek

A Review of The Andromeda Strain

Greetings 1000 Bookies!  The next stop on our journey of reading and promoting the 1,000 Books to Read Before You Die we arrive in the late 1960s United States and enter the world of science fiction to discuss the classic novel, The Andromeda Strain.  In 2020 America, living under the burden of the Covid-19 virus, The Andromeda Strain does not seem that far fetched.  Candidly, the series of events raised in the book had never crossed my mind until reading—are there viruses in space?  And those viruses could attach to our probes and spacecraft?  The story shows that even with the best technology and communications system at the time, human error in decision making still plays a major role in processes and events. 

The Andromeda Strain was published over 50 years ago.  The novel was the first published by famous author, Michael Crichton.  At approximately 400 pages, the story is fast paced and fairly easy to read. However, there is a bibliography because Crichton quotes from text books and scientific journals, giving the story a very real feel even though it is a novel.   I always loved the mind of Michael Crichton.  Ever since I was 17 years old and sitting in the movie theater watching Jurassic Park, have I admired his blending of science and situations.  Just this week I read an article that scientists may be able to bring back dinosaurs in the next 5 years, even though we have two books and 5 movies that tell us specifically what a bad idea that concept is.  When Crichton died young in 2008 at the age of 66, the world lost a talented genius. 

I have always taken a more laidback appreciation of Science.  I was not a very good student in the sciences in my academic career.  However. I do enjoy science fiction novels.  Michael Crichton always applied enough science into his novels to make you think and the reader learns something.  “The combination of cutting-edge science and sheer narrative bravado breeds a kind of terror of discovery that puts his best efforts firmly in the lineage of H.G. Wells’s The Time Machine or Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Lost World” said James Mustich when writing about the novel in his epic 1,000 Books to Read Before You Die.  Michael Crichton made science come alive for me. 

As any American male, I have been fascinated with outer space—Star Wars, Star Trek, and other space stories.  I always have been awestruck over the space program. But I never thought about the consequences of space travel.  Are their viruses in space?  And what would happen if a virus returned attached to one of the flights back?  That is the premise of The Andromeda Strain.  When the book was written human beings traveling to space was less than a decade old, and America had not sent the first humans to the moon as of yet.

The crux of the story deals with the scientific preparation, process, decision making ability, and the effect human error has on all these.  The Andromeda Strain begins with the routine retrieval of a space satellite.  The military has been preparing for this since the dawn of the space age where they developed Project Wildfire.  The satellite crashed back to Earth in the desert town of Piedmont, Arizona.  The military sends a retrieval team as per their process.  The retrieval team shows up at night, but they seem to notice that something has gone terribly wrong in Piedmont.  The team notices dead bodies on the streets of Piedmont.  Suddenly the two-man team sees a man running to them.  The team is cut off from the military base that they were communicating.  As they say in the space program, “Houston, We Have a Problem”.

The rest of the book focuses on the team of 4 scientists that try to prevent this virus from exploding and killing the entire human race.  In a Crichton novel the characters are secondary to the story line, science is the main character in this story. You will neither love or hate the characters in this novel, they are not that memorable.  The virus is memorable.  The book discusses the protocols of dealing with an outbreak including the use of tactical nuclear strikes to prevent spread.  The story discusses the failsafe in the process and protocols.  I find reading technical stories from many years ago interesting because of the limits of telecommunications and the IT infrastructure.  Michael Crichton was great at bringing cutting edge technology into his stories, a great example was email in the novel Disclosure in 1994.  

I have read several Michael Crichton novels, many of which have been turned into movies and television shows.  The Jurassic Park franchise being the most popular.  The Andromeda Strain was first made into a movie in 1971 and remade into a miniseries by A&E in 2008 starring Benjamin Bratt (Law & Order),  Eric McCormack (Will & Grace) and Viola Davis (How to Get Away with Murder).   In 2019, the Crichton estate granted permission for an author to write a sequel to The Andromeda Strain entitled The Andromeda Evolution.  Maybe someday I will read it. 

The Andromeda Strain is a good novel that still resonates in today’s world.  I would recommend adding this title to your summer reading list!!!!

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