Dragon Teeth audiobook

Another posthumous offering from Crichton. I hope they keep finding them! This book was great! It is a western - pure and simple - gunfights, saloons, Indian war controversy, and even the appearance of some famous Western names. But, instead of gold nuggets, the treasure is dinosaur bones.It's something I think people really don't think about. One of the best sources of dinosaur bones is the American West, and their discovery began right in the middle of all the tobacco chewing, stage coach holding up, showdowns at high noon barbarism we equate with westward expansion. Imagine in the middle of that, thousands of miles away from resources and safety, college professors and students with no gunslinging skills digging up thousands of pounds of fossilized bones and transporting them hundreds of miles across a barren landscape at risk from a wide variety of dangers to get to the nearest train station that will get them and the bones safely back to their civilized Ivy League school in the east. Well, you don't have to imagine it, Crichton has you covered! In the afterward it says that his idea for this story began back in 1974 - long before Jurassic Park. It is amazing it took this long for the book to come out. Sad that he missed it!You like Crichton? You like Westerns? You like paleontology? Read this!

Nine years after the untimely demise of the bright Dr. Michael Crichton a good writer , more talented than many believed, his third posthumous novel Dragon Teeth, is published (he's been busier than numerous authors still technically alive) . If you're looking for an early version of Jurassic Park you will be disappointed, but this book has a feel to it that will keep you turning the page...Essentially the story of two ruthless pioneering paleontologists , historical figures, and great rivals in the 19th century, "The Bone Wars" , digging in the old , dangerous west , in canyons , hills , deserts, always lethal accidents or unfriendly incidents can occur, caused by humans both red and white, for dinosaur fossils , an ancient extinct animal, recently discovered. College professors Othniel Charles Marsh from Yale and his younger, former friend Edward Drinker Coke, from the small Quaker university in Philadelphia, Haverford, both are mad. Any underhanded trick to spoil and discredit the other is fine, they hate with a passion. Big eastern newspapers, (if you pardon the pun, had a field day with their plots) grown men , seeking glory in new finds... And loathsome childish pranks that kept readers amused. William Johnson 18, a lazy freshman at Yale, a rich man's son, quite full of himself, during the centennial celebrations of 1876, held in his hometown, Philadelphia, a short trip from the New Haven, Connecticut campus were he doesn't study...twice put in probation, wrecking private property he gets bored easily and father pays for damages...what's the big deal? Professor Marsh is taking students out west this summer, and Mr. William Johnson, not wanting to lose a bet from his nemesis a fellow arrogant student , an insufferable archenemy... so instead of a leisurely pleasant voyage to Europe and a sightseeing tramp around the continent... it becomes a dirty, awful, backbreaking dig for some old bones as the relentless sun and boss, burns your hide... the Sioux are on the warpath ( if I were you, I'd stay out of Montana), all this nuisance just to show how brave he is.... Famous people he encounters, (Wyatt Earp in particular , is charismatic) on trains and western boom towns , some less known, quickly after a brief acquaintance, enter boot hill , not very happy going... Marsh and Coke he works for the unscrupulous duo, not at the same time obviously, neither one tells the truth very often or fails to kick a man when he is down. An unexpected, enjoyable romp into history, for people who like to experience the atmosphere of a bygone era and walk in other men's and women's boots. They too can join their hazardous adventures for a short duration...

Most of us get a fuzzy feeling when an author seems to include us in an inside joke. The writer is, of course, someone we'll never meet let alone befriend, but unlike appreciating the performance of an artist or actor or musician, the musing of a writer feels more personal. In just one novel, he or she whispers into our mind's ear for ten or fifteen or twenty solid hours as we read. In a way, it resembles conversation.When that time together brings us to familiar territory, it can feel like traveling home with an old friend. And that is where I've been these past few days.I am a geoscientist. While most people have a vague notion of what we do in our areas of specialty (look at rocks? drill oil wells? watch volcanoes explode? predict earthquakes? dig up fossils?), what we experience in undergrad and graduate studies is not widely known. We all spend weekends and months and weeks doing field work, clambering over hills, hiking mountains, and noting, measuring rock formations, then drawing maps that reflect an area’s geology. Not that you care, but this writer really did!What Crichton's characters - based on real geologists - went through is something I've lived and breathed and sweated myself. Climbing and digging through rocky outcrops, assembling a picture of the past, fending off heat and exhaustion in the name of curiosity alone... all of my various weeks of field work came back clear as a bell. This was the 'inside joke' for me, and it was thrilling!The geologists in the tale are vertebrate paleontologists - people who study fossilized bones. Marsh and Cope, real people, were in huge competition with one another in the late 1800s, racing out west to find the biggest and most unusual fossils they could find. Their hatred for one another was legend, and I can remember hearing wild stories about them in my very first geology course nearly 40 years ago. To trick his nemesis, one of them grabbed the skull of one prehistoric creature, limbs of another, the tail of yet another, and so forth - knowing full well his competitor would try to steal credit for this 'new' creature. The other accidentally switched the pelvis around of one dinosaur and the other turned him into a laughing stock for it. They told awful lies about one another to boot.The story here follows a young man who ends up on one of their major fossil digs and along with fellow students, has to fend of attacks by the Sioux, by gunslingers, and by his competitor's geology team. We get death by arrows, gun fights in Deadwood, and poisoned water holes here.Any book by Crichton is going to include science, of course, but in reading this one - the one that gave birth to his later ideas for Jurassic Park - it felt like coming home. Lots of western fun, great trivia, good suspense. Of course, I loved it.

In 1876, the hunt for ancient bones is more thievery than science. When a spoiled Yale student takes a bet that he can’t survive one summer in the Wild West with paleontologist Othniel Charles Marsh, he’s in way over his head.His boss might be paranoid, but the bullets are real.This is one fantastic story! Dragon Teeth is a thriller set in the past (not a Jurassic Park novel), so the antagonists read like Indiana Jones villains in the Wild West. (Not dinosaurs.) But here’s the crazy thing: they’re actual historical figures. And the locations and surrounding events that form the novel’s setting are real too—including the intense rivalry between paleontologists Marsh and Cope. Only the direct plot line is invented, and not even all of that.Crichton blurs the line between fact and fiction just as masterfully in the distant past as he does in the near future of his best sci-fi titles.In fact, the only character that seems to be entirely fictional is William Johnson himself, and he’s one of the most realistic protagonists we’ve ever read. He’s rich. He’s spoiled. He’s arrogant. And his development over the course of the novel is one of the most fascinating aspects of the book.The beginning does a marvelous job of introducing William and laying the foundation for the world he lives in. The very idea of evolution and extinction was tantamount to heresy in 1876; the hunt for credible evidence was shrouded in secrecy; and the rivalries between fossil hunters played out with a level of intrigue and espionage worthy of Mission Impossible.Once the novel hits the Wild West, it grabs you and never lets go.This comes as no surprise from the author who wrote and directed the 1973 film Westworld, the movie on which the modern TV series is based. Crichton has a love for the time period that shines through every page, while bullets fly in the untamed badlands—where fortunes can be made and lives can easily be lost over a single “dragon’s tooth.”

What began as a measure designed to protect a young man’s pride soon turned into an adventure that William Johnson would not soon forget. Michael Crichton’s novel about the early days of paleontology in the United States is a mixture of whimsy, seriousness, humor, and just good old fun.The late Mr. Crichton’s manuscript was found in his files by his wife, and it is wonderful to read a “new” novel by a talented author. Though the character of William Johnson was born in Mr. Crichton’s imagination, many of the other people featured in the book were alive back in the 19th century. As readers make their way through the pages, we meet the legendary lawman Wyatt Earp and his brother Morgan, Chicago movers and shakers Armour, Swift, and Field, and various bit players such as Robert Louis Stevenson. It was interesting to learn (after finishing the book) that the two paleontologists featured in the book, Cope and Marsh, were not fictional, and the relationship between the two men was even worse than described in the book.A simple bet sends Yale student William Johnson to the western United States in the 1870s, a trip that William thought would be dull and filled with hours of hot and dusty work. It is not long before William finds himself personally responsible for the success of the expedition, and his resulting adventures are comical and entertaining. Readers should be forewarned that despite the cover illustration, this story is not in the same genre as his more famous dinosaur tales. However, the combination of wild Indians, gun battles, famous as well as devious people and anything and everything Mr. Crichton could think of team to make this a wonderful read. Five stars.

Novela ágil, intrigante y súper interesante! una apuesta lleva al estudiante Johnson de la Universidad de Yale a una frenética aventura en busca de fósiles, donde la traición y la crudeza del Oeste serán un peligro constante. Recomendada!

A wonderful read after recently watching Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. This has a prequel feeling of the original dinosaur finds in the West and encountering the Native Americans, and it was delightful to have accurate historical figures take prominence in the book with visits to locations of Montana and Deadwood. If you have ever enjoyed a Michael Crichton book, then this one also starts off a little slow but then quickly gains steam as you get sucked into the wild west and the intrigue around the "teeth" and "rocks."Solid 4 Stars

I havn't read any other Michael Chrichton's other books but of course I have seen all the movies and have loved every one. This is what I like in a book real history in a fiction story with real people and places to set the story. I read and I have the computer beside me to look up the people and places it's my happy place. There is such a place as deadwood. The people were crazy brave back in the past and even though travel was slow and tough it didn't stop them from going out exploring. This is set in 1876 William Johnson was hoping to go to Europe for summer break but instead finds himself traveling across America after another student dare's him to join Marsh on a dinosaur bone hunt. He leaves as a yale student and returns as a man having faced all sorts of dangers. Wonderful.

A previously unpublished book. If you're expecting Jurassic Park, the prequel, you will not get it. This is a Wild West type of story. To be more precise, a historical fiction tale set in the Wild West of 1880s about the literally cutthroat competition between 2 key figures in the hunt for dinosaur bones. A rare step away from his normal speculative fiction back into the early days of dinosaur fossil hunting. What we now call palentology but with less bloodshed.From his research, he presents a novelization of his interpretation of what happened in this real life clash over discovering dinosaurs. Begins with an snotty rich college kid who gets "forced" into joining a dinosaur bone hunting expedition in order to save face among his peers. Not a great start. Jerks like that, who needs them? The first hook for me was that he dedicates himself to learning photography in order to be allowed into the very selective group. Then there's the odd and seemingly paranoid stuff from the professor about credit stealing conspiracies. From there, I don't think it's an unfair characterizion to say that he became Alice and fell down a rabbit hole lined with dinosaur bones and Indian arrows. Not the best Crichton book ever, but a decent one and since he's been 6 feet under for almost a decade, I'LL TAKE IT! Thank you to the publisher for the free copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

4.5 stars