Helpful Score: 9
Douglas Preston is truly an artist with words (he's smart enough not to have to resort to prefanity-filler text - surely a very pleasant rarity to encounter as a reader! An added bonus for me - he didn't resort to cheap sleazy sex scenes, I don't even remember a single sex scene, the story stood on it's own without any kind of tawdriness.) and he didn't disappoint in that regard with this story. I was THERE while reading this book, I felt the intensity of the western desert heat and felt the thirst of the characters. I "saw" the ancient American dwellings. I "saw" the ancient Tyrannosaurus and other dinos and their habitat and way of living.
While Preston is creative and imaginative, he has a unique flair of mixing those qualities with true facts perfectly, much like Crichton and Koontz. His books always make me think WOW! it's certainly feasible something like that is possible...and it continues to make me think & learn new things.
Also he is extremely knowledgeable in the field of archaeology and incorporates that knowledge into his stories masterfully. He's an archaeological correspondent for THE NEW YORKER magazine and travels worldwide to archaeological sites. I have a love of archaeology, mysteries, and sci-fi, all of which Preston uses to a certain extent (not so much sci-fi as the others).
He's an expert long-distance horseman and a member of the Long Riders Guild; he knows the western U.S. up close and personal and bases many of his stories there.
I do have a few complaints, one is that the story was a bit slow in the beginning, another is that I thought it would be similar to Jurassic Park, but that was just my assumption. The last "complaint" is I was unable to tie a few things together by the end, but again that was probably my fault. If I read it again before it's ordered I might be able to tie up the loose ends :)
While Preston is creative and imaginative, he has a unique flair of mixing those qualities with true facts perfectly, much like Crichton and Koontz. His books always make me think WOW! it's certainly feasible something like that is possible...and it continues to make me think & learn new things.
Also he is extremely knowledgeable in the field of archaeology and incorporates that knowledge into his stories masterfully. He's an archaeological correspondent for THE NEW YORKER magazine and travels worldwide to archaeological sites. I have a love of archaeology, mysteries, and sci-fi, all of which Preston uses to a certain extent (not so much sci-fi as the others).
He's an expert long-distance horseman and a member of the Long Riders Guild; he knows the western U.S. up close and personal and bases many of his stories there.
I do have a few complaints, one is that the story was a bit slow in the beginning, another is that I thought it would be similar to Jurassic Park, but that was just my assumption. The last "complaint" is I was unable to tie a few things together by the end, but again that was probably my fault. If I read it again before it's ordered I might be able to tie up the loose ends :)
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