The 'Next' Michael Crichton novel

I just finished reading Next by Michael Crichton. I am a huge fan of his and have read all of his books. I have to say that at least for the first half of this one I was a bit disappointed. He introduced to many characters and I began to lose track of who was who. He was distinctly lacking in the science this time which seems to be an unfortunate trend. I think he is now thinking way too hard about the fact that almost al of his books get turned into movies. He is setting it up in his books to be movie-ready at the expense of the social information and science he is so well known for in books like Jurassic Park and Terminal Man. This book, called Next, is about the new world of genes and genetic manipulation. A very scary and amazing topic. It doesn't really have a main character or story-line which took some figuring out. I think it would have been beneficial to have known that before i started reading. About half way through things started getting a lot more interesting and it ended up being not a bad read. He certainly brought up a lot of thought-provoking topics and makes the reader realize how out of control the whole gene-patenting and exploitation could get. I think actually the some of what he describes is already happening. He starts the book off with this statement, "This book is fiction, except for the parts that aren't." Actually, he is very vocal in this book about his disdain for big corporations, those corporation's big wigs, and the evils of out of control advertising. I am surprised that there is not some kind of big counter attack from the big companies that use genetics and patent genes. They must know how popular he is. But I guess since he writes "fiction" he can get away with it.
So, anyway, I do recommend this book, but just realize that it might be a little slow going and a little lacking overall. I hope he doesn't continue to get away from the science in his books! Needless to say I won't be going to see the movie version when it is made because almost all of the movies from his books suck!

I hope everyone has a great New Year!