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Unabridged Audio ISBN 0679457976
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Review by James Neal Webb
Michael Crichton has the Midas touch when it comes to writing. While he may not be as prolific as Stephen King, he did write the novel that was made into the number-two box office earner in history, Jurassic Park. He also created the number-one show on television for the past two years, ER; most of his novels, from Congo to Disclosure have been made into movies, and his last novel, The Lost World, will try to strike gold on the big screen next year. Stephen King should be so lucky.
One key ingredient in the Michael Crichton formula for literary success is timeliness. His first novel, The Andromeda Strain, was written back in a time when our astronauts returning from the moon were quarantined for fear of spreading some extraterrestrial germs, and his more recent works have dealt with everything from xenophobia to gene-splicing to sexual harassment. Airframe is no different, and in light of recent tragedies in Florida and off the coast of New Jersey, it is very topical.
When a wide-body jet en route from Hong Kong to Denver suffers a mysterious systems failure that leaves three people dead and scores seriously injured, it is up to the plane's manufacturer, Norton Aircraft, to determine what almost brought the bird down. Casey Singleton, a single mom and Vice President of Quality Assurance, is a member of the IRT, the Incident Review Team, for Norton. She and the other members of the IRT must sort out the mountains of data from what is arguably the most complex machine ever built -- a modern jet aircraft -- and find out what went wrong, and they must do it quickly; a sale with the People's Republic of China is pending, and the future of the company hangs in the balance.
The investigation proves to be anything but routine; the pilot is in a coma, the jet's black box recordings are scrambled, and the evidence at hand makes no sense. Mix this with some union workers incensed at the prospects of jobs going overseas to a communist country, a 60 Minutes-style investigator with scandal on her mind, and the possibility of industrial espionage, and you've got a real puzzler in Airframe.
If this book were terrible, it wouldn't make a bit of difference, because it is no doubt destined to be a bestseller. Happily, this is not the case. Airframe is a good book, obviously well researched and certainly well written. Still, there are a few loose ends to the mystery that never quite get tied up, and the book is a little slow to get off the ground, but these are minor faults.
If Airframe has any ax to grind (and this may generate some controversy), it is with the carriers, who take the fine jets the manufacturers give them and literally run them into the ground. At least that's the impression you get from reading this book. I don't know if I would take Airframe on my next flight -- better to wait and read it when you get home.
©1996, ProMotion, inc.