Michael Crichton was born in Chicago, Illinois, in 1942. He was educated at Harvard College and Harvard Medical School and graduated summa cum laude from Harvard University.

At twenty-three, Crichton was a visiting lecturer in anthropology at Cambridge University, England. Upon his return to the States, Crichton began training as a doctor, and was graduated from Harvard Medical School in 1969. He paid his way through medical school by writing pseudonymous thrillers, one of which (A Case of Need, 1968) won an Edgar Award. By the time he graduated, Crichton had already written a bestseller (The Andromeda Strain, 1969) and sold it to Hollywood. He then pursued postgraduate studies at the Salk Institute in California before taking up writing full time.

Michael Crichton is married and lives in Los Angeles.

Crichton has written twelve novels :

• The Andromeda Strain, 1969
• The Terminal Man, 1972
• The Great Train Robbery, 1975
• Eaters of the Dead, 1976
• Congo, 1980
• Sphere, 1987
• Jurassic Park, 1990
• Rising Sun, 1992
• Disclosure, 1994
• The Lost World, 1995
• Air Frame, and
• Timeline, 1999

Each of which displays an intimate knowledge of a different, specialist subject, among them primatology, neurobiology, biophysics, international economics, Nordic history and genetics.

He has directed six movies, including Westworld, Coma, and The Great Train Robbery, and is the creator of the hit television series ER (which won eight emmys in 1995).

He is a computer expert who wrote one of the first books about information technology (Electronic Life, 1983); he has run a software company; he has designed a computer game called Amazon; is a committed collector of modern art and the author of a learned study on Jasper Johns (Jasper Johns, 1977).

His other works of nonfiction include Five Patients: The Hospital Explained, 1970, and Travels, 1988. Crichton's novels have been translated into twenty-four languages; eight of his novels have been made into films, including Jurassic Park, one of the most successful films in motion picture history.