I may be in the minority on this, but I prefer reading books after seeing the movie or show they are adapted from. I didn’t read the Song of Ice and Fire books until I was watching the second season of Game of Thrones. I didn’t read Fight Club, No Country for Old Men, or The Shining until years after I had seen the movies multiple times. I think I prefer to go into a movie fresh, not knowing what is going to happen, and do not mind having a good idea of how a book is going to unfold. I like going in and having a director’s interpretation of a story confirmed or challenged as I read, and a fair amount of the time I finish the book and say, “The movie was better.”
So, Jurassic Park. Yeah, the movie was way better. There are a number of changes made by Spielberg in his adaptation and I’d be hard-pressed to find one that doesn’t improve upon the source material. Some of the best moments in the movie (the T-Rex chasing Malcolm, Sattler, and Muldoon) are not present in the book, but the characterization is the big improvement. Ian Malcolm is much less charming when he’s not being channeled by Jeff Goldblum. Lex is actually younger than Tim, who actually possesses the computer skills she is given in the movie. The warmth that Richard Attenborough gives Hammond is completely gone. His book counterpart doesn’t even seem to care that his grandchildren are in mortal danger. Though my biggest complaint is that Dr. Grant loves kids from the start. His arc of going from a man who is annoyed by, maybe even hates children, to a protective father figure for Lex and Tim is missing and replaced with basically nothing.
Now, it is still a book where people are chased and eaten by dinosaurs, and it does a pretty good job of delivering that. It is an easy and still entertaining read, though I can’t say it is one that lovers of the movie need to go out and read. It would increase your love of the first movie, but only because it is such an improvement on the book.