In the Nevada desert, an experiment has gone horribly wrong. A cloud of nanoparticles—micro-robots—has escaped from the laboratory. This cloud is self-sustaining and self-reproducing. It is intelligent and learns from experience. For all practical purposes, it is alive.

It has been programmed as a predator. It is evolving swiftly, becoming more deadly with each passing hour.

Every attempt to destroy it has failed.

And we are the prey.

As fresh as today's headlines, Michael Crichton'smost compelling novel yet tells the story of a mechanical plague and the desperate efforts of a handful of scientists to stop it. Drawing on up-to-the-minute scientific fact, Prey takes us into the emerging realms of nanotechnology and artificial distributed intelligence—in a story of breathtaking suspense. Prey is a novel you can't put down.

Because time is running out.

"Now, I could be really mean and point out that lines such as "I read confusion on her face" and "I left the room, feeling odd" have no business being in any book, even a manifestly commercial genre novel, but Crichton is not an author to be evaluated on the poetry of his sentences....He's a terrible writer, but we do learn a lot about algorithms and systems here. And how many novels can you say that about?" Adrienne Miller, Esquire (read the entire Esquire review)

"Prey is irresistibly suspenseful. You're entertained on one level and you learn something on another." The New York Times Book Review

Michael Crichton does it again with "Prey, " a terrifying page-turner that masterfully combines the elements of a heart-pounding thriller with cutting-edge technology. Deep in the Nevada desert, surrounded by nothing but cactus and coyotes, a swarm of molecules--self-replicating, fast-evolving, and very predatory--threatens life itself.

Michael Crichton, who died in Los Angeles on November 4, 2008, was a writer and filmmaker, best known as the author of Jurassic Park and the creator of ER. His most recent novel, Next, about genetics and law, was published in December 2006.

Crichton graduated summa cum laude from Harvard College, received his MD from Harvard Medical School, and was a postdoctoral fellow at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, researching public policy with Jacob Bronowski. He taught courses in anthropology at Cambridge University and writing at MIT. Crichton's 2004 bestseller, State of Fear acknowledged the world was growing warmer, but challenged extreme anthropogenic warming scenarios. He predicted future warming at 0.8 degrees C. (His conclusions have been widely misstated.)

Crichton's interest in computer modeling went back forty years. His multiple-discriminant analysis of Egyptian crania, carried out on an IBM 7090 computer at Harvard, was published in the Papers of the Peabody Museum in 1966. His technical publications included a study of host factors in pituitary chromophobe adenoma, in Metabolism, and an essay on medical obfuscation in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Crichton's first bestseller, The Andromeda Strain was published while he was still a medical student. He later worked full time on film and writing. One of the most popular writers in the world, his books have been translated into thirty-six languages, and thirteen have been made into films.

He had a lifelong interest in computers. His feature film Westworld was the first to employ computer-generated special effects back in 1973. Crichton's pioneering use of computer programs for film production earned him a Technical Achievement Academy Award in 1995.

Crichton won an Emmy Award, a Peabody Award, and a Writers Guild of America Award for ER. In 2002, a newly discovered ankylosaur was named for him: Crichtonsaurus bohlini. He had a daughter, Taylor, and lived in Los Angeles. Crichton remarried in 2005.