Rating: 
Summary: Crichton scores with under water adventure
Review: After going on a prehistoric island and then deep into the African Congo, Micheal Crichton ventures deep into the bottom of the Pacific ocean for a story that will keep you guessing time and time again.
Lying at the bottom of the Pacific is a futuristic U.S. spacecraft that seemed to have crashed there over 300 years ago. A trained group of military specialists along with a pyschologist, are assigned to live in a habitat set up at the bottom of the ocean next the ship and explore it. The presence of an alien sphere and strange occurances cause the crew to suffer heavy losses and have their lives changed forever.
This book used the idea of the existence of black holes, and that in the future, humans will visit alien lifeforms of other planets. Along with the solid story line, Crichton created one of the most intriguing books i have ever read. I am usaully very good at predicting what is going to happen in a novel, but this book constantly had me thinking one thing, and finding out that later that what I thought was totally wrong. Sphere was very hard to put down and suspenseful throughout.
Rating: 
Summary: The book is better than the movie!!!
Review: I'm so glad I read this book before I saw the movie because I probably wouldn't have picked the book up after seeing Sharon Stone, Dustin Hoffman and the other stars playing the parts so unlike was portrayed in the book. That's just my opinion though. The book was definitely 10 times better than the movie with the portrayal of strange huge squids above the undersea station and other fantastic, mind boggling happenings that can only happen in a book. Things that special effects can't even make up for a movie. The book was spine chilling to the point that I felt as if I were in the seastation with the crew. The story is about a strange sphere that appears in the deep ocean. I don't know how everyone else read it but I felt the writer was trying to convey to us that the sphere was not from outspace at all but was from the future and had actually been made in the USA. I'd still give the movie version of this book 3 stars but I implore you, if you decide to see the movie, read the book first! Great story, great plot, great writer as always.
Rating:
Summary: Chilling...
Review: This is another book from Crichton that I love...It's about a huge spaceship found at the floor of the ocean, and the team of scientists that go down to find out what it is, and what it's for. The strange part? It's been at the floor of the ocean for hundreds- maybe even THOUSANDS of years. The cool part? It was and American ship sent there from the future and has a large sphere on the inside. Soon after they discover the ship, one of the team members opens the sphere and walks inside. He's found later, unconscious outside it. And after that, strange, coded, messages appear on the underwater station's computers from an unseen character named 'Jerry'. Bad things happen, presumably coming from Jerry; a huge squid attacks the ship over and over again, and soon only three members of the team are left. From its interesting beginning to its chilling ending, this book carries you on a thrill ride that seems entirely possible... just like all the Crichton books.
Rating:
Summary: Enter the Unknown
Review: I have recently read Sphere by Michael Crichton. I found this book to be filled with adventure and intrigue. It follows a very intelligent psychologist, Norman Johnson. He is sent to what he thinks is a plane crash site. He normally goes to them to help the families cope with the loss of loved ones. He thought it was just a routine job and that he would be home shortly, he was wrong. The government called him in to research an underwater spacecraft with a team of experienced scientists. He set up the team and went underwater into a habitat to study the craft. He gets more and more involved as the team enters the craft. The suspense starts to build up when they enter the ship and terrible things happen to the crew. As they venture further into the craft they find a shiny silver ball about the size of a large merchant ship. They enter the ship and that's when everything goes wrong. The sphere seems to be able to look into their minds and know what they are thinking. It will carry out the task that that person is thinking about. As the story develops more, each team member gets scared for their lives and starts to distrust one another. The sphere begins to carry out terrible tasks and many team members lose their sense of sanity. Norman has to take complete control of the team and make sure that the rest stays sane and in a working manner. As the sphere gets more and more violent, the team has to make a choice between leaving and forgetting about a scientific breakthrough or continue on with their important investigation.
Rating:
Summary: A page-turner, but with a disappointing end
Review: This is one of the few novels is really couldn't put down before finishing it. Crichton succeeds in the first half of the story in building a powerful sense of mystery integrated in an admirably well-documented scientific and technical background. This background justified making the spaceship an american ship from the future as the only logical possibility. At this point, you can only expect the explanation to the mystery that is the sphere they find inside to be something extraordinarily imaginative, as the author dropped hints at what the possibilities are (I liked the idea of beings from a more than 4 dimensions world; how would they have interacted with our world? Our the possibility of time and space reversing roles.) Unfortunately, the author's imagination seems to suffer a breakdown in the second half of the book. Making the sphere a modern equivalent of the good old Aladdin's lamp, a device allowing one's to make anything one's wishes come true, was an easy and disastrous way out. Anyone who has ever tried writing knows there is no better way to kill the plausibility of your story than giving infinite powers to your characters (near the end, when Dr Goodman acquires these powers himself, why don't he uses them to get back home instantly and solve everything as if nothing happened instead of doing it the old, painstaking but more interesting way? And at the end, why don't the survivors use these same powers to resurrect their dead companions?) So after closing this book, we are left feeling a bit disappointed. It would be interesting to pick up this story from the middle and try to write a more imaginative conclusion.
Rating:
Summary: Another Crichton Masterpiece!
Review: I personally could not set this book down. I'd seen bits and pieces of the movie at a friend's house and decided to read the book to find out how the story ended. The book was much much better than the parts of the movie I saw... and they left out a lot of major story elements in the film. Whether you've seen the movie or not, Sphere is a must read for anybody who enjoys the science fiction genre. Crichton is an amazing writer, but unfortunately his books are usually turned into second-rate science fiction flicks (with the possible exception of Jurassic Park, which was awesome back in 1993). I think this is at least partly because so much of the appeal in his writing comes from the mental dialouge and thought processes, which cannot be conveyed to viewers of a film. Definitely hit this one up if you've got some spare time; it's worth every second!
Rating:
Summary: This is one of the best books ever!
Review: Sphere by Michael Crichton is one of the best books I've ever read, it's full of suspense action, and some of the best character interactions I've read. I would strongly recommend this to anyone who likes any other book my Crichton (Jurassic park, Andromeda Strain, Airframe, Congo etc.).
"For a decade, Norman Johnson had been on the list of FAA crash-site teams, experts called on short notice to investigate civilian air disasters... This time his wife, Ellen, had been annoyed because he was called away on July 1, which meant he would miss the July 4 beach Barbeque" (Crichton 4)
In the first chapter you meet Norman Johnson a 53 year old psychologist whose being called out to the middle of the Pacific Ocean, for what he thinks is just a routine crash inspection. He soon finds out it's much, much more than that. You quickly find out that there is a "Space Ship" 1,000 feet below the surface of the Ocean, and there's "something Alien" inside.
"They walked into the room, moving among the giant hands and claws. And they saw, nestled in the padded hand, a large, perfectly polished silver sphere about thirty feet in diameter. The sphere had no markings or features of any kind" (Crichton 104)
This is "The Sphere" and it is what the book is about. Without giving too much away, when you go in, everything changes and not necessarily for the better. As soon as this is introduced the book really starts to pick up.
"Now the feet of the body were swinging just above his head. Norman climbed another step, and one of the boots caught in the loop of the air hose that ran from his air pack to his helmet. He reached behind his helmet, trying to free himself from the body. The body shivered and for an awful moment he thought it was still alive. Then the boot came free in his hand, and a naked foot-gray flesh, purple toenails-kicked his faceplate... He turned the body so he could see the face. 'It's Levy.'"(Crichton 200)
If this type of writing doesn't intrigue you then this book really isn't for you, but as soon as I started to read this book I couldn't put it down. It's got everything a great book needs, action, suspense, philosophy, science, and everything else you need.
Rating:
Summary: A scientific thriller that will leave you spellbound!
Review: Psychologist Norman Johnson finds himself called to the middle of nowhere, somewhere in the South Pacific. Here, he is told that a spacecraft has crash landed--some three hundred years ago. Sent down with a small group of qualified scientists, Johnson must help unlock the mystery the craft presents. But the very fact that the spacecraft is 300 years old is to be dwarfed by other discoveries they make...and their fears mount as people begin to die... Michael Crichton is probably the best science/thriller writer currently behind the keyboard. His characters are real, and his plots, while outlandish, bristle with intense reality. "Sphere" is a classic novel of terror and discovery, and of the fate people must chose for themselves. A superb novel, one of the best works from one of the best writers.
Rating: 
Summary: Very different from other Crichton
Review: This was one of Crichton's fastest books to read. I found it very hard to put down and extremely fun. The conversations between the characters are informative and match Cricton's style for teaching the reader about science. All of the fantasy aspects keep the suspense and excitement up. If you are able to suspend your disbelief, you will thouroughly enjoy this book. It is fast-paced and suspenseful, and in the end it will leave you thinking. This is one of Crichton's best and I recommend it to anyone.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting idea, but too slow-moving
Review: Norman is a psychologist who once participated on a project for the Carter administration that he viewed largely as a joke: what to do if we ever encountered extra-terrestrial life. When he is suddenly summoned to what he thinks is a airplane crash site, he finds instead that the Navy has found an alien spacecraft deep in the ocean. The team Norman recommended for just such an occasion has already been assembled and he's been included. But what they all find is more powerful and dangerous than anyone imagined.
I found the story slow-moving and almost dull until it got near the end. Yes, the end was pretty exciting, but this just wasn't a thrilling page-turner like some of Crichton's books. The idea was very interesting but the book just didn't have the momentum to keep it exciting. Not one of my favorite Crichton books - 3.5 stars.
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