The Lost World

A classic and precursor to the books and movies on dinosaurs residing in our world is today’s RA Favorite book, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Lost World.  A reporter, Edward Malone, learns of an expedition through an interview with Professor George Edward Challenger, who has returned from a trip.  Malone believes that by attempting the trip to help discover prehistoric beings he may bring the type of career and praise from his newspaper that will launch his stardom.  Additionally, he is motivated to demonstrate his bravery to his love, Gladys Hungerton (I don’t find many leading ladies named Gladys, besides my wife!!).  Chancellor shares his claims of the prehistoric creatures that he found while surveying the Amazon area in South America.  None of the people in attendance believe Chancellor’s claim, so they decide to join him on his return voyage.  And so they are off!  With the help of some native villagers, the four men and their assistants begin the long trip up the mountains. The trip includes encounters with numerous dinosaurs, including the pterodactyls!  Of course with any good tale of intrigue there are moments of murder, abrupt surprise actions, and of course surprise attackers, in this case, ape-like animals whom attack the explorers.  The group gets stuck in a bind when one of the assistants turns on them and cuts them off from civilization when he destroys a bridge leading back to the mountain across the plateau.  Will they escape?  Will Malone ever see Gladys again?  Don’t worry, all of the loose ends do get tied up nicely and Malone does get saved.  He even gets to be reunited with Gladys, but I’ll save that surprise ending for you to find out.  Hard to believe this is a 1912 novel.  Great intrigue and see why Michael Crichton used this as the basis for his story.  I really enjoyed it.  Great book!!!