Jurassic Park is a science-fiction thriller novel written by American author Michael Crichton and first published in 1990. It chronicles the story of an eccentric genetics CEO who builds an amusement park containing live dinosaurs cloned from ancient DNA. The book was followed by a sequel in 1995, The Lost World. Jurassic Park has been adapted into one of the most successful movie franchises of all time, with the first movie released in 1993 and the entire franchise grossing over $5 billion worldwide as of 2022.

This guide uses the 2015 Ballantine Books Mass Market Edition of the novel.

Plot Summary

Jurassic Park introduces its premise with a warning about the corruption of modern science: It is unchecked, based on profit, and unparalleled in human history in its achievements. Molecular biology is a particularly dangerous and profitable field which has seen massive growth in recent years. In an attempt to be ahead of its rivals, InGen, a company run by eccentric John Hammond, fools investors into funding the creation of an amusement park containing real live dinosaurs.

In the novel’s opening scene, a man who has been violently attacked is rushed from a helicopter to a local medical clinic in Costa Rica. InGen employee Ed Regis gets off the plane with the injured victim but refuses to admit that he was attacked by dinosaurs. The victim vomits blood and has a seizure, dying on the floor of the clinic. This scene foreshadows the horrors to come. A few days later, reports emerge about lizards attacking infants in their cribs. They are no ordinary lizards, and the symptoms that result from their bites are severe. The lizards are never officially connected to the park, but it is heavily implied that they originated there and are in fact dinosaurs.

Dr. Grant, paleontologist, and Ellie Sattler, paleobotanist, are on an expedition in north Montana when they receive a visit from John Hammond. He requests that they come see his marvelous park, assuring them they will appreciate what he has created. They oblige after he offers them a large sum of money. Hammond also summons Ian Malcolm, mathematician, who specializes in chaos theory and believes the park is destined to fall into ruin. Hammond’s lawyer, Gennaro, is also in attendance, keen to determine if the park is safe to open after hearing of the attacks on the workers and the possibility of escaped lizards. Lastly, Hammond invites his grandchildren, Tim and Lex Murphy, to prove that the park is safe for children. Hammond employs several workers, but key characters include Dr. Henry Wu, genetic biologist and creator of the dinosaurs, Ray Arnold, the park’s arrogant chief engineer, Dennis Nedry, the programmer, Robert Muldoon, the game warden, and Gerry Harding, the veterinarian.

The visitors arrive and begin the tour, enthralled by the dinosaurs they see. Nedry is a rogue employee who forces a power shutdown at the park so he can steal and sell some dinosaur embryos, leading to the fences turning off and the security systems going down. Nedry successfully steals the embryos and the Jeep he needs to get to the dock, but he takes a wrong turn on his way out and ends up being eaten alive by a dilophosaurus.

With the power in the park shut down, the electric track-powered Land Cruisers become stuck on the track right outside the Tyrannosaurus enclosure. Regis is in the first car with Tim and Lex, and he runs in terror almost immediately, leaving the children alone. The T-rex appears and destroys the vehicle with Tim inside and throws Lex elsewhere. Grant and Malcolm watch on from the car behind. The children survive, but Malcolm panics and gets out of the car to run. He is picked up and tossed by the T-rex, and although he is found and attempts are made to save his life, he dies of infection later. Grant finds the children, and the three of them see Regis mauled by a baby T-rex before running off into the jungles of the park.

Meanwhile, Sattler is with Harding following some small dinosaurs in the gas-powered Jeep. They hear Muldoon on the radio asking for the vehicle and return to the lodge. Muldoon takes Gennaro and goes out looking for survivors but only finds Malcolm. He turns his attention to repairing broken fences. Grant and the children find a shelter and fall asleep inside, awaking the next morning to find the power still off. They start making their way back to the visitor’s center, encountering herbivores and carnivores along the way. Back at control, Arnold and Wu try to get the computer systems working again so they can restore power to the park. Malcolm is slowly dying, uttering philosophical ramblings about the nature of Hammond’s creation and humanity’s foolish attempts to control the natural world. He insists that his theory, the Malcolm Effect, is coming true before their eyes: Chaos is inevitable.

Grant and the children avert disaster several times, including a stampede, herds of carnivores engaged in mating rituals, and encounters with both the adult and infant T-rex. They are chased down the river by the T-rex, attacked by massive flying cearadactyls outside the aviary, and trapped inside a waterfall in one final T-rex attack. Muldoon tranquilizes the T-rex, unknowingly saving Tim’s life before he is eaten. Grant and the kids finally reach the visitor’s center. After this, the velociraptors become the problem, and Tim and Lex manage to evade death by trapping one inside the kitchen freezer. Grant gets the power back on in the park, and Sattler and Muldoon distract some raptors near the lodge long enough to give Grant time to do so. In the midst of it all, Hammond decides to go for a walk to his bungalow and slips and falls down a hill. He breaks his ankle and becomes vulnerable, eventually being attacked by the dinosaurs he created and killed. A similar fate befalls Dr. Wu and Arnold who are eaten by raptors.

Grant, the children, Sattler, Muldoon, and Gennaro all survive the chaos of Jurassic Park. They manage to call the mainland for help, and helicopters arrive to take them home after they have the privilege of witnessing some velociraptors attempting to migrate. They watch as the Costa Rican military bombs the island, killing everything on it. None of them are allowed to leave the island as both Costa Rica and the United States have various uses for them, so they are put in a hotel in San Jose. Several weeks later, Grant gets a visit from a mysterious American man who tells him there are reports of strange lizards migrating across the land. Grant already knows what this means, and the stage is set for The Lost World.