A review by risky_oak
The Venom Business by Michael Crichton, John Lange

«I began writing as a medical student, and felt that I would continue as a doctor and ought to protect my patients from the fear that they might pop up in the pages of a thriller. The best protection would not be to disguise them, but to disguise me. Once I decided not to practice medicine, I dropped the pseudonyms expect for convenience. I wrote too much, so I decided to publish some books under false names, and in that way, could publish more books.»

And that's how Michael Crichton began his writing career. One of my favourite and most read authors. The creator of Jurassic Park, Westworld and ER, among many others.

From the summer of 2011 until November 2018, I read 19 of the 32 books he published. November 2018 was the 10th anniversary of his death. That's when I decided to do a project dedicated to Crichton. One book per month for the next 32 months.


The thrillers he wrote as a medical student between 1966 and 1972 under the pseudonym John Lange were eight, and with the exception of the last one he wrote in 1972 (the year he decided to publish under his own name something that lasted until his death,) were a large part of his bibliography that I had not read. So I ordered them all in one go.

Every time I need to review one of these I'll repeat this general introduction about his early writings rather than extensive reviews on each individual book.

Because beyond the interest of reading early works of your favourite author, reading what he wrote and seeing his writing slowly evolving, they are not masterpieces and you cannot dedicate more than five lines for their sake. It's like Schwarzenegger movies. You are having a good time and that's it. And I also didn't want to confuse you every second day with a new book by Crichton.

They were written quickly and, as he said, he wrote them to gain money to pay for utilities and groceries while he was a student.

They are not masterpieces as I mentioned above, but their writing was something like writing exercises, a writing with which in the medical thriller [b:A Case of Need|35385796|A Case of Need|Jeffery Hudson|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1496874074l/35385796._SY75_.jpg|2651727] (that he wrote in 1968 under another pseudonym (Jeffery Hudson)) gained the Edgar Award in 1969.

A year in which he published for the first time under his own name one of his best novels, the science fiction thriller [b:The Andromeda Strain|7670|The Andromeda Strain (Andromeda, #1)|Michael Crichton|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1587497243l/7670._SY75_.jpg|997271], which was made into a film in 1971.
In 1970 he and his brother Douglas Crichton co-wrote another hippie thriller under a common pseudonym Michael Douglas ([b:Dealing, or The Berkeley-To-Boston Forty-Brick Lost-Bag Blues|147780|Dealing, or The Berkeley-To-Boston Forty-Brick Lost-Bag Blues|Michael Douglas|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1350488267l/147780._SX50_.jpg|142616]). This would be his third and final nickname.
In 1972, with [b:The Terminal Man|7679|The Terminal Man|Michael Crichton|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1461056182l/7679._SY75_.jpg|2651704] under his own name, he realised that his career was now a writer, not a doctor, so he put the pseudonym in the bottom drawer.

The eight books he wrote as John Lange remained out of stock since the late 1970s until the publishing house Hard Case Crime began publishing out of stock and hard-to-find books in the noir, thriller, detective, and generally pulp fiction categories.

Among them are books published for the first time such as [b:Joyland|13596166|Joyland|Stephen King|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348154483l/13596166._SY75_.jpg|19185026] and [b:The Colorado Kid|10574|The Colorado Kid|Stephen King|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1422099676l/10574._SY75_.jpg|856005] by Stephen King.

While Crichton was still alive, two of his books, [b:Grave Descend|652837|Grave Descend|John Lange|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348433385l/652837._SY75_.jpg|638947] and [b:Zero Cool|2767617|Zero Cool|John Lange|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1390275543l/2767617._SY75_.jpg|2793340], were edited by him.
In November 2008, unfortunately, Crichton passed away, so in 2013 the remaining 6 books were released.

Because I don't want to tire you out anymore and give you acute Crichtoniasis, I'll talk briefly about this one.

The Venom Business 1969: read it in June 2019
Crichton's longest book as John Lange, the only one with more than 300 pages.
A snake tamer is hired by an old acquaintance as a bodyguard, but it seems that the target is himself and not his acquaintance.

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