'Eruption' is a collaboration between Michael Crichton and James Patterson

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Books, Arts

4.2 • 672 Ratings

🗓️ 5 September 2024

⏱️ 9 minutes

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Summary

Jurassic Park creator Michael Crichton spent years working on a manuscript about a volcano on the verge of a disastrous eruption in Hawaii. After he died in 2008, his wife Sherri found his boxes and boxes of research and decided the novel needed to be finished – so she hit up James Patterson. In today's episode, she and Patterson speak with NPR's Ari Shapiro about how they got Eruption across the finish line more than a decade after her husband's death, and how they managed to pass off the pen throughout the course of the novel.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, it's Impair's Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbong. Writing has a reputation for being a lonely,
0:07.8	solitary act, but that doesn't always have to be the case. The new novel, Eruption, has a few cooks in
0:14.6	its kitchen. It was originally an unfinished manuscript by the late Michael Crichton, and it was
0:19.7	finished by best-selling writer James Patterson, along with Sherry Crichton, and it was finished by best-selling writer James
0:21.6	Patterson, along with Sherry Crichton, Michael's wife. In this interview with MPR's R. Shapiro,
0:26.8	James and Sherry talk about collaborating, how they would send ideas and outlines back and forth,
0:32.2	all in the service of completing someone else's vision. That's coming up.
0:38.4	In the U.S., national security news can feel far away from daily life.
0:43.2	Distant wars, murky conflicts, diplomacy behind closed doors.
0:47.7	On our new show, Sources and Methods, NPR reporters on the ground bring you stories of real people
0:53.1	helping you understand why distant events matter here at home.
0:57.4	Listen to sources and methods on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.
1:02.7	Two of America's best-selling fiction authors have collaborated on a new book, James Patterson and Michael Crichton.
1:10.1	What makes this especially remarkable is that Michael Crichton died of cancer nearly 16 years ago, but his wife, Sherry, found an unfinished manuscript, and James Patterson took it over the finish line. The novel is called Eruption. James Patterson and Sherry Crichton, welcome to all things considered.
1:26.7	Thank you. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Sherry, did Michael, welcome to all things considered. Thank you.
1:28.4	Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
1:33.7	Sherry, did Michael talk about this project with you while he was alive, or did you just discover it after he passed?
1:37.8	He didn't really speak about any project when he was alive.
1:42.1	It was always his private work, but he spoke about this one.
1:48.8	And I think the reason why he spoke about this volcano story is because it was so close to his heart.
1:54.0	It takes place in Hawaii, a place that he loved for years.
1:55.8	He would always go to the big island.
	...

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