Michael Crichton, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of
Jurassic Park, returns to the world of paleontology in this recently
discovered novel--a thrilling adventure set in the Wild West during the
golden age of fossil hunting.
The year is 1876. Warring Indian tribes still populate America's western
territories even as lawless gold-rush towns begin to mark the landscape.
In much of the country it is still illegal to espouse evolution. Against
this backdrop two monomaniacal paleontologists pillage the Wild West,
hunting for dinosaur fossils, while surveilling, deceiving and
sabotaging each other in a rivalry that will come to be known as the
Bone Wars.
Into this treacherous territory plunges the arrogant and entitled
William Johnson, a Yale student with more privilege than sense.
Determined to survive a summer in the west to win a bet against his
arch-rival, William has joined world-renowned paleontologist Othniel
Charles Marsh on his latest expedition. But when the paranoid and
secretive Marsh becomes convinced that William is spying for his
nemesis, Edwin Drinker Cope, he abandons him in Cheyenne, Wyoming, a
locus of crime and vice. William is forced to join forces with Cope and
soon stumbles upon a discovery of historic proportions. With this
extraordinary treasure, however, comes exceptional danger, and William's
newfound resilience will be tested in his struggle to protect his cache,
which pits him against some of the West's most notorious characters.
Drawing on both meticulously researched history and an exuberant
imagination, Dragon Teeth is based on the rivalry between real-life
paleontologists Cope and Marsh; in William Johnson readers will find an
inspiring hero only Michael Crichton could have imagined. Perfectly
paced and brilliantly plotted, this enormously winning adventure is
destined to become another Crichton classic.
