Prey

Time for a thriller with a scientific/technology driven story by popular American author Michael Crichton.  The book is called Prey, and based on his well-received previous stories like Jurassic Park, you probably know what is in store for you.  This book is a bit less “over the top” but still is riveting with a new breed of life being created by a company that is experimenting with a new human species of sorts.  Jack Forman is a former software programmer married to Julia who is a high-ranking executive employed at a nanorobotics firm called Xymos.  The couple has three children.  During his inability to find a job (he was fired for having attempting to turn in one of the executives of the firm for stealing money but Jack is the one who lost the job and now he is being blackballed in the industry), Jack is home raising the kids.  Jack notices sudden changes in his wife, thinking she is having an affair with someone from the company, he catches her in lies.  Julia is becoming aggressive and almost “bi-polar” in her mood swings.  Julia is rarely home and on one night after dinner returning to work she is almost killed in a car accident. The children notice the changes in their mother and also a “presence” of sorts in the house, like a spirit of some sort.  Jack is finally offered a job at Julia’s company to assist with the software product he had created at his former company and is asked to come and fix the flaw, which Julia’s company is now dependent.    Jack goes to the off-site location which begins a steady spiral of incidents that leads him to confronting the “evil presence,” a new force which was technology-created by Julia’s company and he learns has taken over the other’s bodies!!!  This thriller ends with a confrontation with the virus which infiltrates the body of others with certain contact by those who have the virus, Julia and the man she is having an affair with, Jack’s former mentee!  The story takes place over a seven day period with the narrator (Jack) giving a detailed account of the timing and the decisions and choices he needs to make along the way.  A good read as I find with all of Crichton’s books.  Listening to it doesn’t do as much justice to reading or I’m sure if (and when) it makes it to the big screen.