Prey by Michael Crichton

Have you ever thought about microorganisms you inhale day in, day out?
How about the itch at the back of your neck as you read this blog entry?
Are you really sure that the air you breath is clean? The itch is harmless?
Why don’t you reach back and scratch that itch... just do it before you continue to read this posting… :-P

Which brings us to the review of this book entitled “Prey by Michael Crichton”; because miniscule particles are not as harmless as it seems.

Published in year 2002, this novel is based on tale of misguided bunch of scientist creating nanobots based on genetically modified E.Coli bacteria for Department of Defense. Pushed into the main storyline is our protagonist, Jack Forman who used to be a top notch artificial software programmer until he was booted out for revealing his boss’ under-table dealings.

Being a house-husband and his wife (who works as VP for Xymos, a nanorobotics company) as sole breadwinner pushed him to the brink of emotional roller coaster as he suspected his wife for having an affair behind him (clues: very tight clothes, late night bath before sleep, late night phone calls and wearing those “f*ck-me-heels”).

Things started spiraling down when his kid was afflicted with severe rashes only to be cured instantly when they loaded her into MRI scan. He was then offered by his ex-boss to work with his old gang of programmers to rein in a swarm of escaped nanoparticles, which shows obvious sign of evolving, reproducing, self-sufficiency and the ability to learn and innovate.

Wait a minute... this is boring book review... what am I doing writing a formal book review!!
Crazy me… let me restart…

Ahem…!

This book is about a bunch of people trying to rein in a bunch of escaped nanoparticles originally designed for military purposes. So basically it’s about human against a swarm of nanoparticles with intelligence!

So did we (as human) wins?

Of course we win, we always win due to our ingenious; think-out-of-the-box intelligence. The team of protagonist in the novel smoked, lured, tagged (not individually-lah of course), tailed, before finally bombing the swarm’s hideout.

In the end, the swarm is not the only problem they have because some of the “smarter” swarm has found a way to co-exist symbiotically with humans!

Yes ladies and gentlemen, some of the particles decided that living inside a human host and propagates via kisses (or something else not mentioned in this book :-P) is the best way of surviving amidst the land of crazy Homo-sapiens.

But of course, our heroes in this book will not let this happen without crossing over their dead bodies. So they combat back with more particles; which is bad for the symbiotic particles but harmless for human; and after that, they bombed the place to smithereens to complete the annihilation.

What do I think about the book?
Hmmm… I think I got smarter after reading it :-D

I can now talk about the potential harm of tweaking stuff on minuscule level without considering its future consequences.
It would be like introducing vector A to kill vector B only to realize that vector A is harmful to the environment and will go on to kill vector C, D and E.

Told you I’m smarter now...hehehe…


Personal rating: 7 out of 10

Cons:
1) Sometimes long winded explanation on scientific stuff; which is essential to the progress of the storyline but drags the pace of the story itself

Pros:
1) Ingenious assimilation of family problems with technical mumbo-jumbo in one action packed storyline.
2) One of few novels I’ve read with citations to actual thesis/dissertation/white paper on actual researches done.