Customer Reviews

Fantastic Voyage

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The book "Fantastic Voyage", by science fiction writer Isaac Asimov, is one of the greatest sci-fi books I have ever read. The book is about five people, who are shrunk down to miniature size and injected into a man's body to destroy a blood clot. If they fail, the man will die and the Americans will lose all of the information he can tell them to win a war they are fighting. It described the exact situation of the main characters in wondrous imagery. It was told in third person omniscient point of view, and described, in incredible beauty, the feelings of every character. I also enjoyed the feeling of suspense that Asimov projects by causing several problems to fall upon the characters, rerouting the course of their sub several times. I think anyone who enjoys books about the future, government, anatomy, and sci-fi in general will love this book, which ought to be a classic.

When I was in junior high school, I stumbled upon this book in the library. Since I loved the movie when I first saw it on TV, I eagerly checked this book out. As it turned out, "Fantastic Voyage" was a book I usually checked out repeatedly. Years later, I rented the movie again years with the book fresh in my mind, and I realized that Isaac Asimov's version was much better than the Richard Fleischer film. The characters are more interesting and complex on paper than they were in the film. Robert Boyd is extremely bland and boring, and it's painfully obvious Donald Pleasance is the villain. Asimov makes Boyd's character charming and resourceful, and Pleasance's character is very interesting. (In fact, his motives in the book are much different than in the film.)

Another thing that Asimov does is try to make the plotline a little bit more scientifically realistic. In the movie, the crew simply suck in air from an alveolus in the lungs when their oxygen tanks are depleted. In the book, Asimov has the crew MINIATURIZE the air so that it can go through their tube faster.

Personally, I think this is a great book. But if any sci-fi fans are disappointed in this, so was Asimov. He didn't like the idea that he was adapting someone else's work, so in 1987 he wrote an original novel called "Fantastic Voyage II: Destination Brain." (The title is misleading, since it isn't a sequel.) People who do not like this book are advised to read the other one...

Isaac Asimov's novel is based on the screenplay by Harry Kliener and a story by Otto Klement and Jay Lewis Bixby and is a very easy read. The world has been divided and battling for control for over half a century. A scientist, Benes, from the Other Side, has been vital in keeping the two factions of the world technologically even, and has now defected. He claims to have important information involving the fate of the world. Grant is the agent in charge of getting Benes to into the hands of the good side "With him in charge, I feel as safe as it is possible to feel, which isn't much. Grant ran the whole thing; flicked Benes out of Their hands like a seed out of a watermelon". However, while being transported to headquarters, the Benes is injured in an assassination attempt. Five scientists are shrunken and injected into Benes' blood stream. They must survive traveling through his body and successfully operate on a deadly blood clot in his brain. The "submarine's" journey is filled with dangers and challenges and it seems as though there is a traitor on board. "For every trick We've got, They've got a counter-trick; for every man We've got planted on Their side, They've got one planted on Ours." The only complaint is the mass amount of dialogue, the cliché cast of characters might bother some people, but I thought they were humorous. Overall I found this book to be an easy-to-read, quick source of entertainment and recommend it to anyone looking for a fun read.

books when I was a kid,except for this one. The thought of miniaturizing one's self and going into a body in order to save it seemed lame and contrived. Because of this, I avoided this book for the longest time. Finally, I gave in and gave it a chance. It was worth it.

The book has some flaws. The flow of the book is not very fluid. It's somewhat abrupt and I was forced to re-read a few paragraphs, especially in the beginning. Even though the level of detail is great, it sometimes became too much and I was bogged down with a cell structure instead of concentrating on the action.

That said, the rest of the book is amazing. Asimov does a great job explaining how miniaturization works, and develops an interesting scenario involving wars, weapons, spies, and scientists in which such a procedure was neccesary under a specific time frame. The characters themselves are not truly developed, but instead are used to focus and contribute to the action. A major plus indeed.

Asimov seems to weave a story where the human body turns out to be a major battlefield. A place where blood flow causes havoc and where white blood cells are monsters. He transports the reader into a new dimension where the mundane suddenly becomes catostrophic. With this, and his knowledge of the human body, he make a great action and suspense novel.

This is a short read and gets to the point. Asimov wanted to write a great tale involving action and biology, and it is well done.

Fantastic Voyage is really a fantastic voyage. The book starts with a mysterious man on a plasma plane, heading towards some secret destination. Then General Carter and Colonel Reid is introduced. They are the directors of a mission, to welcome a man of great importance. Then Dr. Michaels and Dr. Duval and his assistant Mrs. Cora Peterson is introduced as high, professional doctors. Then the book talks about Charles Grant, an old friend of this mysterious important person. As the scene turns to the airport, Captain Owens is introduced as another good friend of this mysterious person. Finally, the plasma plane lands and the important person, now called Benes, greets Captain Owens. They go into a limousine headed towards headquarters but on the way, a kamikaze car slams into the limousine and injures Benes. There is a blood clot forming in his brain and surgery is impossible to perform because the clot is inside the brain. Therefore, the only way to help Benes is to go into his body using a miniatuized submarine. A crew is chosen, Dr. Michaels, Dr. Duval, Cora Peterson, Capt. Owens, and Grant to get into Bene's bloodstream to the clot to destroy it. Along the way, a series of misfortunes happen and a enemy agent is suspected. First, a mishandled laser gun, then, the air tank leaks, afterwards, many close to death encounters. However, inside the submarine Proteus, relationships develop and new characteristics about each person is discovered. Finally, the mission is a success and Benes is saved.

I was first given the book by my English teacher as a book project. She wanted us to read the book, write questions about the book, find significant paragraphs in the book, locate new and difficult words, and illustrate interesting parts of the book as our book project. Later, she would want us to do commercials and advertise the book to other students inthe class, convincing them of why the book I read was the book to read and buy. At first, I found the book very boring and uninteresting, but for a good grade, I read on. Later, the book started becoming more and more exciting, more action, less talk. At the end, I was hooked on the book and I reread the whole book again.

My favorite part was when the crew was in the process of miniaturization. It was interesting to learn and see how the submarine is shrunk and how the crew reacts to the new experience of shrinking. The process is long and difficult. First, the crew enters the ship and a big machine fires a laser beam at the sub. The ship shrinks to the size of a speck of dust. Then the sub is picked up, ever so carfully and lowered micrometer by micrometer at a time into a saline container. Then miniaturization continues until the large tank is the size of a bottle. Then a hypodermic needle is inserted into the ampule and the ship is injected into Benes' neck. A very interesting book and I really enjoyed the adventure of the mini people.

The Fantastic Voyage by Isaac Asimov is a book for the adventure lover, the scientist, and the detective in all of us.
During a cold war set in the future, a submarine full of scientists, miniaturization experts, and a spy is miniaturized to the size of a large bacterium and injected into the human bloodstream to remove a blood clot in the brain of brilliant scientist. I loved the suspense of not knowing who the enemy was. The descriptions of the human bodys normal reactions to a microscopic invasionwhat a white blood cell chasing you might look likefascinated me too.

Fantastic Voyage was my first SF book, which I read back in high school (around 1998) for some book report or another. I never got hooked into the genre until it was 2006 and looking back twelve years, I wanted my first book of 2011 to be my first SF book. Now having read it a second time through, it's obvious that memory is the first thing to go - I didn't remember a single thing! I'll have to pick it up in another 12-years time to see if that holds true.

For the most part, Fantastic Voyage lives up to its name. A microscopic tour of the various organs and vessels of the human body accompanied by a collegiate lexicon and detailed surveys. The voyage does manage to inspire awe if taken away from the mediocre dialogue and entire done-once-too-often spy-in-the-midst who-dunnit. The closing pages of that who-dunnit mystery really ends the novel on a bad note. It siphons the awe built up over scores and scores of pages in parallel with the tense situation of when and how the submarine crew will be able to deal with the blood clot.

The characters are wholesome, unwavering and altogether a group of generic typecasts (the strong-armed secret serviceman, the beautiful and innocent assistant, and the serious but out-to-lunch scientist). Relationships are thin, transparent and eventually eye-rolling ensues when the love story unfolds and when angers clash.

So, while written as SF it's quite a good read, a real carnal romp through a human being. On the literary level, it's blow over. A few good words thrown in for good measure but some sentences are just don't read right: "The ship gleamed in sterile whiteness from the featureless bluntness of its prow..." Really, is a sentence with an alliterative pattern of -ness -less -less considered interesting to the reader's eye? On the same hand, the superfluous bits (you know... only, the plot and the cast) are wafer thin in originality. These two aspects need to be redone to be equated to the SF, which was so wonderfully thought out.

This story is about how five people shrink down and go into this scientists body, and try to destroy a blood clot in a scientist's brain with a laser. Throughout the entire book the team uncovers many problems that they must face to complete the mission. The team has only 60 minutes to get to the clot and destroy it, and get out of the body. If they don't get out in time theywill kill Benes and themselves.

This book also contains many real world elements, even though it is based in the future. I really liked this book and any sci-fi reader would like it ,too. The book is pretty dirty, there are nine cuss words in the first twelve pages. I would recemned this book more for the older aged group. Again I really enjoyed this because of the action, supence, andthe few serious parts. This book could be just a little better in the begging. The begging is so boring. Thats the way all novels are.

The story is great, and even educational. Asimov's science and visual settings are excellent and, well, fantastic. But the characters were painfully cliche. Perhaps they weren't when the book was written, but they certainly are now.

You have your main character: A tall, strong, and dashingly handsome take-charge guy of infinite courage.

And your sidekick (pretty much): A beautiful, young, intelligent woman who wants only to be respected for her intellect and not her perfect body and flowing hair.

The dialogue between these characters is ludicrous at best, and takes up a depressingly large amount of the novel. Y'know - Him constantly hitting on her in a rather pushy way, and her constantly deflecting his come-ons with a secret physical attraction for him. And yes, his heroic strength saves her more than once. And, of course, they get together in the end.

I respect Asimov tremendously, but this book was like Lucas' Episode III: A great story with a horrendous script and characters. And also like Episode III, I finished it trying to convince myself that I liked it, but was pretty much just annoyed that I gave it the time that I did.

Do you want to learn about your body while reading an exciting story filled with adventure? Issac Asimov's book, Fantastic Voyage, based on a screenplay by Harry Kleiner, is a great book for young readers. In this story, our future world is divided in two, with both sides competing in the fields of science and technology. Five people are miniaturized and inserted into the body of a man named Benes from the other side. Their mission is to destroy a blood clot in his brain so he will survive to relay valuable information. Asimov describes every step of the miniaturization in exquisite detail, which helps the readers to immerse in a story that they can believe. Traveling on a miniaturized submarine, the five rescuers are inserted into Benes' neck. They plan to travel up to Benes' brain to destroy the blood clot with a miniaturized laser before they are returned to their normal size in sixty minutes. However, the microscopic crew encounters many problems and obstacles along the way. The submarine ends up traveling through Benes' lungs, heart, and ear before it is able to reach its final destination. Therefore, the readers learn more about different parts of the body and what it would look like on a microscopic scale. Little does the crew know that one of them is an agent from the other side sent to sabotage the mission.

One of the few downfalls to this book is the lack of character development. There is also an abundance of cheesy dialogue between the macho main character Grant, and the pretty girl, Cora, playing hard to get. I would recommend this novel to young adults in middle school because it is easy to read, exciting and informative. To find out what happens to the mission, Benes, and learn about the inside of a human body, read Issac Asimov's Fantastic Voyage today!