State of Fear

State of Fear Summary | Plot Summary

Published in 2004, State of Fear is the latest in a long series of techno-thrillers by Michael Crichton. The novel focuses on the issue of global warming and eco-extremists are plotting to affect the climate in severe ways that will support a media-driven campaign to amass large amounts of cash from wealthy donors. The donors are naively committed to a cause that is portrayed by the media as an imminent threat to mankind, but that is not supported by legitimate research. Near the end of the 500-plus-page novel, Kenner, sort of an atmospheric super-cop, explains in a soliloquy that governments maintain their power, and keep order among the masses by keeping people in a constant State of Fear. He cites the "military-industrial complex" that Eisenhower warned of during the Cold War as an example. He claims that after the demise of the Soviet Union—the boogieman for that era—a new threat emerged in the U.S. and Western Europe. He calls it the "Politico-Legal-Media" (PLM) complex, and cites the ecology movement as one of its greatest tools.

Crichton sets the stage with a summary of the "Vanutu Lawsuit." The lawsuit was filed after a global-warming conference by the National Environmental Research Fund (NERF) against the EPA on behalf of the people of Vanutu, a small atoll in the Pacific. The suit claims that the EPA was negligent in policing the environment and, as a result, the ice caps are melting, which will cause a rise in sea level and will flood Vanutu and displace the natives. George Morton, a retired super-billionaire, funds NERF, and is naively convinced of the truth of the claim. As are most of the lay advocates of the global-warming cause, George is portrayed as well meaning but dangerously uninformed. As the plot develops, George becomes suspicious of NERF when the hype doesn't reflect the facts he is learning from Kenner. In his or her own turn and time, other characters, such as Peter Evans, George's attorney, Sarah Jones, George's assistant, and Jennifer Haynes, assistant to the chief counsel on the Vanutu suit, also become convinced that the global-warming cause is bogus. Eventually, these four, augmented by Sajong Thopa, Kenner's Nepalese grad student, team up to do battle with and defeat the eco-terrorists.

Under Kenner's leadership, the group uncovers a plot by NERF, fronting for the real-life eco-terrorist group, the Earth Liberation Front (ELF), to create a series of three or four deadly atmospheric catastrophes. The events are timed to coincide exactly with a NERF conference on "abrupt climate change," which is ostensibly caused by global warming.

What ensues is a frantic, action-bloated chase by Kenner and his intrepid troops to prevent the catastrophes. They manage to uncover and prevent a colossal caving of the largest iceberg in the history of Antarctica, a killer thunderstorm in Arizona, and a tsunami in the Solomon Islands that is aimed at the California coast. They also uncover an attempt to alter the course of a hurricane, which is abandoned by the eco-terrorists before the effort gets underway.

The novel climaxes in the Solomon Islands, where cannibals eat Ted Bradley, an obnoxious TV actor who hooks up with the group to spy on Evans. State of Fear ends with the bad guy subdued, but the promise remains of a continuing battle between the forces of legitimate science and the evil forces of politicized, legal media hyperbole about the imaginary dangers of man's misuse of the environment. In one conversation with a do-gooder environmentalist, Kenner sums up the danger by saying that misinformed good intentions are a deadly combination. The book closes with George Morton promising to continue the fight with a new foundation dedicated to legitimate atmospheric research. He expects Sarah and Evans to help him and carry on his work after he dies.