My long commute allows for many books on tape to be "read." For more facts (and tons of citations) on global warming, including the likelihood that it will increase poverty and starvation in developing countries, it's an excellent read. Essentially, the part of the plot related to global warming is that the story posits a lawsuit is filed by a Pacific island nation against the EPA, suing for damages due to rising sea levels due to global warming. A good part of the book follows the legal team's preparation for trying to "prove" this in a court of law.

The results are that they abandon the lawsuit for lack of the American civil standard "preponderance of the evidence." Instead, they settle for a big press conference and go back to trying their "case" in the media.

As a novel, probably about average for Crichton. I preferred "Jurassic Park" and "Congo" for better characters and a tighter plot.