Travels : Adventures of a Author as He Tries to Find Balance Within Himself

Travels By Michael Crichton

Okay this is a very odd duck in my book collection. I grabbed this book out of a high school book sale. It is Michael Crichton’s Travels. I did not really look into what the book was about. I was just down right stunned that there was a book by my favorite author that I have not read. I was so sure it would be something amazing. They all have been (Well except for State of Fear because it was trying to disprove something that was real. But that’s a tale for another blog.) and I soon went to work on reading it.

What is Travels exactly? Well much to my surprise it is not a science fiction, society metaphor, or period piece as I thought, based on his previous works. It is a somewhat disjointed autobiography, not of his life but how he found a balance in it. As the book title states it recounts his travels, both physical and spiritually within oneself. This is not a book telling a success story with his writings, how he became inspired to writ,e or any sort of struggle on the way to the top. The book is not what you would expect it to be. But let’s review what’s good and what is bad.

The good? Well there are write a number of interesting parts. The book can be seen as a collection of short stories so its easy to pick and choose. The more interesting I believe were the first four or five stories about medical schools and working in the medical field. It exposed a lot of injustice and malpractice in the 1970's medical field. Most of it was intriguing it was just very interesting and I felt it was written beautifully in a way that could hook anyone not caring about the medical field. There is another short later on called Jamaica where Michael and his girl friend are having relationship problems while on vacation. Because his girlfriend’s stubborn attitude and annoyance toward Michael she hires a “guide” who is a raggedy and half drunken man. He turns out to be a convicted killer that they must somehow shake. Beyond that, the Shangri la and Mount Kilimanjaro stories are interesting but not as special. His inner travels for me at least were highlighted by his perception of the roles of men and women, that caught me off guard. It made me a bit mad at first but then I realized he was mostly right. Not about every little detail but he hit the mark better than I would have before I read this book. I found it to be quite fascinating. Also his story called “they” that addresses sexism toward men was intriguing as well because that does exist in some fields. So I was glad that he support not only feminism but equality too.

Now the rest of the book ranged a average meh to really reaction. This I should considered the bad. Well bad for me. Others might dig this stuff. Turns out Michael was a yuppie who had a family with money, connections, and got a book and movie deal with is first book, that made him seem very removed from reality for me. I tend to like to read about people more common. Another thing is, he goes from being grounded in reality to a pseudo hippie as the book goes on. And don’t get me wrong, I like to write and my imagination can run wild, so I can have a open mind. Some will say will have auras, and maybe they do. Are ghosts real? Never seen one, but there had to be something afterlife right? Spaces aliens. Well yeah. We can’t be all alone, but the conspiracy theories are rubbish. But Crichton starts with curiosity and goes further and further down a rabbit hole. When he goes to multiple psychics to see if they can really tell him things he would only know was intriguing. A little weird maybe. but it wasn’t all that odd. I think that stuff is interesting. Out of all those hoaxes is it possible one is real. But then he goes channeling, astral projection, spoon bending, reliving past lives and eventually a exorcism. I’m not going to say he’s full of it . After all, he is the only who really knows what happened, (I certainly wasn’t there) but it seemed implausible. His mind could have been easily subjective to the hippie group environments. Or at least that’s what it seems like to me. But further he strayed form his grounded start in reality, the least plausible and interesting it was.

Overall this book is niche. So niche that this is a niche within a niche. If you’re a author and you’re real this looking for inspiration, you’re not going to get it here. It’s just, I don’t know. I don’t know who this book is meant for except a philosophy major. It isn’t bad, its just meant for a very specific group of people. I’ll give it 2 smoothies out of four.

2 smoothie out of four.

Overall Ratings: Adventures of an Author as He Tries to Fnd Balance Within Himself.