Melissa

Huge fun. I bought the book with some trepidation. On the one hand, Crichton is always entertaining. On the other, I had been led to believe by the media response that the book was an attempt to discourage people from taking responsibility for their impact on the environment. I decided to read it with a sceptical mind. Nobody was going to convince *me* that global warming was a hoax, by golly.
To my surprise, I began to really enjoy the book despite the blatantly manipulative characterization of the pro-environmentalist protagonist as a credulous dupe. It helps here if you have a sense of humor about yourself.
I realized I had never *seen* any data that actually demonstrated the reality of global warming as a consequence of human actions. I had been *told*, but I had never seen the data. Kind of like high-school algebra, where even if you got the answer right, you couldn't get credit unless you showed how you *got* the answer.
I highly recommend the book as entertainment. Just bear with the dufus protagonist for the first half of the story (he gets better), and don't let your preconceptions spoil the fun.