Back From the Dead: Unknown Works by Crichton Discovered

by Guy Adams

Like the dinosaurs he created in Jurassic Park, or the mutating virus at the centre of The Andromeda Strain, Michael Crichton is back from the dead. The late author will mount a final assault on the best-seller lists from beyond the grave.

Crichton, who died of cancer in November aged 66, left a treasure trove of work on his personal computer, his estate revealed yesterday. The valuable cache includes a completed historical thriller and roughly a third of a new science-fiction novel. Both will be released over the next 18 months, with the first novel, an adventure story called Pirate Latitudes set in 17th-century Jamaica, hitting stores in time for Christmas.

"Pirate Latitudes is obviously unedited, but the book is complete, and it will all be his own work," said Julia Wisdom, Crichton's UK publisher at HarperCollins. "Like all of his work, he wrote it in secret. He would have these extraordinary ideas, which he'd keep under his hat, before springing them on us when the manuscript was completed."

The new novel features a pirate named Hunter, the governor of Jamaica, and a plan to raid a Spanish treasure galleon. Though it marks a departure from Crichton's trademark science fiction, his US publisher, Jonathan Burnham, said it would be written with his customary eye for factual accuracy. "It's eminently and deeply and thoroughly researched," he told The New York Times, adding that in keeping with its potential blockbuster status, HarperCollins planned an initial print run of one million copies.

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April 11, 2009

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