A missed opportunity.

It’s obvious that a Volcano story would fit well into the Michael Crichton collection.

And it will make a great Hollywood blockbuster. Sony won the bidding war and, enlisting ‘Free Solo’ creators Jimmy Chin & Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi to direct.

Skip the book, watch the eventual movie.

Eruption is a 2024 novel by Michael Crichton and James Patterson, based on an unfinished manuscript by Crichton at the time of his death.

It is Crichton’s 29th novel, … and the fourth of his novels published posthumously.

A thriller about an eruption of Mauna Loa on the Island of Hawaii, the novel was unfinished at the time of Crichton’s death in 2008, but was completed years later by Patterson, at the behest of Crichton’s widow Sherri.

I wanted more scientific detail, like in other Crichton’s books — and less argument / conflict between the team members assembled to save the world.

This one is more James Patterson’s short chapters and fast pace. At times I lost track of the plan on exactly how the day was to be saved.

Watch the film. Skip the book.

Argylle is a 2024 spy action comedy film: Bryce Dallas Howard, Sam Rockwell, Bryan Cranston, Catherine O’Hara, Henry Cavill, Dua Lipa, Ariana DeBose, John Cena, and Samuel L. Jackson.

Argylle Delivers Twisty-Turny Tedium, But Its Action Scenes Are Great

That sums it up.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

I thought the book would be similar.

It’s not.

I thought the book would be a fun action thriller — something like the film.

It’s not.

In 2024, Terry Hayes and Tammy Cohen were revealed as the writers of the tie-in novel to the film Argylle, under the pseudonym “Elly Conway“.

… I can’t really find any relationship between the movie and book from the word Argylle.

At most you might call the book some kind of origin story for Aubrey Argylle.

But the only interesting character for me was the Russian / American uber-villain and wealthy tycoon Vasily Federov.

Fletch Won (1985) is a mystery/comedy novel written by American Gregory Mcdonald.

It is the eighth book to star the character Fletch, but is a prequel set before the events of first seven books in the series.  …

 Irwin “Fletch” Fletcher is moved off of obituaries and wedding announcements at the News Tribune and is assigned his first journalistic interview, only to have the subject turn up dead in the newspaper‘s parking lot. He investigates, beginning his dual profession of journalist and investigator.

Amusing. But I don’t think I’ll continue with any of the other Fletch books.

The book series was twice adapted for film:

• Confess, Fletch (2022) with Jon Hamm as Fletch.
• Fletch (1985) with Chevy Chase.

Chevy seems the perfect fool to play this role.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

 “Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.”.

Bhagavad Gita

Initially, I wasn’t all that interested in either the long non-fiction book, nor the film.

BUT finally got around to both.

The movie is better. Not perfect, but a fantastic job telling a difficult story.

I streamed it on Prime over 3 nights as it is LONG.

 Cillian Murphy would seem to be the best possible actor to play the brilliant, complicated J. Robert Oppenheimer.

Robert Downey Jr. is excellent.

Matt Damon as Gen. Leslie Groves, as well.

Kenneth Branagh as Niels Bohr is perfect. He has the gravitas to bring depth to Oppenheimer’s hero.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

I read American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer (2005) by Kai Bird and Martin J. Sherwin.

Surprisingly, I was quite engaged in his early years. The beginnings of the theoretical Physics that would lead to the nuclear bomb.

Once it got to his downfall due to his security hearing in the McCarthy era. The efforts by Lewis Strauss and the FBI to undermine Oppenheimer — I got restless.

Always conflicted, I wished Oppenheimer had simply walked away from the controversy.

I also read The Oppenheimer Alternative by Robert J. Sawyer, the author being a friend of my brother.

It’s an interesting alternative history of the Manhattan Project historical figures.