I did it again. I always do this. Foreign airport book panic. I look at how much I have left to read and think, well, what if I got stuck for four hours or horribly delayed and just had to sit there with nothing to read? Or I whizz through what I’m reading really fast? Or it turns out to be one of those books that has the first chapter of the next book at the end (I don’t like those) so you’re closer to finishing than you thought?
So I always always panic and I always buy a book at the foreign airport, even though it will cost me about twelve quid, and they only ever have eight to choose from.
Of these, four will be by John Patterson Global Enterprises (do you remember when he was good? Along Came a Spider was so amazing, really scary. Then he started writing nineteen books a year about children who could fly and I went off him); two will be sub- Flowers in the Attic efforts- though please don’t think for a moment that I am dissing the mighty Flowers in the Attic. I would never do that. In fact, I think it might be an interesting study to see what effect there’s been on the psychology of an entire generation that were allowed to read books about brother/sister incest from the age of twelve, on the school bus and everything.
Anyway. There will be a couple of Stephen Kings, who is always a good bet actually- I think he’s a totally magnificent writer. I just don’t think he should let the monsters get in the way of his amazing control of character, pacing, tension, plot and evocation of time and place. It’s all going amazingly, then, oh no, it’s an alien spaceship monster that makes you poo your pants. Anyway, they’re always the ones you’ve read, or the dog one. There will be Bridget. , in case you have been being held hostage since 1994. And there will be MICHAEL CRICHTON.
Why do I do it? Why do I keep panic-buying Michael Crichton books in case the plane gets delayed? Is it a hangover affection for the gift to the world that was Dr Doug Ross & Carol Hathaway? The supreme guilty pleasure that is Demi Moore shouting ‘You get back in here and finish what you started!!!’ in Disclosure? The wildly underrated (well, I suppose it only sold, you know, four million as opposed to sixteen) Timeline?
Regardless. I will buy the new Michael Crichton. It is always about sexy scientists struggling to protect a secret I don’t understand. There are always monkeys in it. I never ever finish it. I rarely even have to open it, because a two hour Ryanair flight with a baby and a toddler offer fewer reading opportunities than you might think.
But it makes me feel secure.
