'Timeline' offers new take on time travel

Michael Crichton, one of the modern masters of science fiction, has once again bent the laws of reality to create an engrossing tale of corporate greed and scientific irresponsibility. This time the heroes of his novel "Timeline" are faced with sword-wielding ancestors of medieval times in the search to rescue one of their own. This novel, the latest of Crichton's work to be adapted to film, is certainly worth the read before the movie hits theaters in November.\nThe novel begins with a family discovering a dying man on the side of the road in the desert. When he is taken to the hospital, the attending physician notices something strange: it seems as though the veins and arteries in his body are not aligned with each other, causing his death. \nFrom this opening sequence we are taken to the headquarters of a high-tech firm headed by the intimidating, tech-savvy billionaire Robert Doniger, who makes Bill Gates look downright cuddly in comparison. Doniger wants to create a theme park based on the past -- a recurring theme for Crichton -- using futuristic technology to make people realistically experience the distant past. Unfortunately, the time traveling technology has a fatal flaw -- some of the things sent through it do not come back aligned properly, like the dead man's veins.\nThis is all well and good until one of the historians who was researching the proposed site for the park sends a distress signal from the 14th century. While the researchers are puzzled in present-day, the time travel technology is revealed by Doniger. A team of historians go back in time through the use of "quantum foam wormholes," quite unaware of the danger that lies ahead of them. \nOh yeah, and the rescue squad has only 37 hours to collect the missing historian and return to the exact spot they were beamed to, or they are stuck in medieval France for the remainder of their natural lives.\nArrogant and convinced they can manage themselves in the distant past, the rescue team comes into close call after close call. They have to avoid offending the bloodthirsty knights controlling the area they are searching, brave a battle, and outwit a rogue scientist from the future who has assimilated into the past. \nWhile the beginning of the novel is very heavy on science, once the rescue team is in the 14th century, "Timeline" turns into a swashbuckling old-fashioned adventure full of intrigue, romance and some really cool battle scenes. Crichton makes the past come alive as vividly as if the reader were also transported back to medieval France. It is an engrossing page-turner that begs to have just one more page read. I highly recommend "Timeline" to anybody looking for a good, quick read.