Airframe

A Novel

By: Michael Crichton

Narrated by: Frances Cassidy

Length: 11 hrs and 9 mins

Publisher's summary

Three passengers are dead. Fifty-six are injured. The interior cabin virtually destroyed. But the pilot manages to land the plane...

At a moment when the issue of safety and death in the skies in paramount in the public mind, a lethal mid-air disaster aboard a commercial twinjet airliner bound from Hong Kong to Denver triggers a pressured and frantic investigation.

Airframe is nonstop Crichton: the extraordinary mixture of super suspense and authentic information on a subject of compelling interest that has been a Crichton hallmark since The Andromeda Strain.

©1996 by Michael Crichton (P)1996 by Random House, Inc.

Still waiting for the movie!

One of my favorite all time Crichton books. It reads very much like a movie and is highly entertaining.

Crichtoningly Entertaining, Phoned-in.. 3.89 Stars

If your a fan of the Chrichton's technically encrusted suspense, you'll recognize classic traits of the author you love. However he must've written this one from the beach house while something more interesting pilfered his time.

It's almost all there; an edifying page turning story featuring an engineering/scientifically gilded plot filled with nuggets of info, an informed view into the milieu of an industry, and an endearing protagonist.. oh wait, that's what's missing. Casey Singleton is no Jack Forman (protagonist from Prey), and feels a bit flat on character flavoring causing her to get lost among similarly bland supporting characters at times.

Also the book leans too heavily on having the reader view documents within the story to push plot points along. This comes off as a short cut device used a bit too often especially at the end which feels rather truncated and may be more "made for video" than I care for.

Cassidy does a great job reading it and surely helps make this work very well as an audiobook you can enjoy while doing something mindless. She has a great comfortably pitched reading voice and cadence, which she transforms masterfully while acting out the characters without overdoing it. Only minor complaint about her performance is that the men all pretty much spound the same and are not always differentiatingly identifiable when multiple are in a given scene. Hardly a serious complaint given how difficult that is to pull off while voicing characters of the opposite gender.

Overall this was a fun listen that I enjoyed while working a farm, it made the time pass by faster and was pretty entertaining. It's not Crichton's best, but it was still enjoyable and enlightening. Would have rated 3.89 stars if possible.

Perfect for "Mayday" Fans

Fans of the TV show Mayday will recognize many episodes in this fictional agglomeration of true events.

The typical Michael Crichton style does not always translate well into audio format because narrating check-lists is very tedious, but in this book it really wasn’t so bad.

Crash Course in Avionics...

I love Michael Crichton's work, especially the educational portions, and Airframe gave me some insight into the world of the airline industry. This one was typical Crichton, with lots of cool info, average character development (not unusual for this author), and best of all, it was a quick-moving, fairly short novel. Crichton completists, don't let this one fly over your head!

Book has some flaws, the end is fun though

Would you try another book from Michael Crichton and/or Frances Cassidy?

Frances Cassidy did a decent job. The characters were hard to tell apart but that's Crichton's fault for introducing secondary characters that had no role.

How would you have changed the story to make it more enjoyable?

A particular scene of danger for the main character made no sense, had no repercussions, and the main character didn't seem to react to it at all. Either Crichton flaked or the editor insisted it be in there, but otherwise it was weird.

Too Technical

Is there anything you would change about this book?

cut down on technical details

What was the most interesting aspect of this story? The least interesting?

How computers more or less fly the planes

Have you listened to any of Frances Cassidy’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

Yes it compares

Did Airframe inspire you to do anything?

Not really

Any additional comments?

On a couple of occasions gave up listening due to the highly technical data

My all time favorite no el

I love this story. Crichton is awesome every time. And i LOVE the narrator. Love her voice and her subtle character voices. Wish she was narrating more books.

Phenomenal Book with Skilled Narrator

Loved every minute of Airframe and learned a ton about the complexities of the aviation industry as well!

Ok book, so so performance

The plot was very interesting and built towards a legit outcome consistent with Crichton novels. But, the big reveal is pretty silly overall as the ultimate truth of the story given time spent listening up to that point.

Airframe Won't Disappoint...

If you like aircraft and drama, then you'll like this book. It combines technical information along with a well laid out plot of "Why?" which drives the investigation. Michael Crichton does it again in this "page turner" (if there were pages!). Enjoy!