It did not seem as if Michael Crichton was on any side, or was bias towards one or the other. .
My interpretation of this author's thesis was an act of a process: The process of Good vs. Evil. This author presented his thesis with support in the story, in a well-prepared fashion. This process was in these steps: good recognizing evil, good fearing evil, evil challenging good, good recovering from and preparing for evil, and good versus evil. .
The first support is the "good" which are the thirteen warriors recognizing the "evil", wendols, and their capability. GOOD RECOGNIZING EVIL. Such example is referred to on page 76 and Ibn-Fadlan says " Buliwyf and his warriors shook their heads at the sight, and I heard them repeat one word over and over: "Wendol" " following that a second quotation on page 77 as Ibn-Fadlan says " The body of a male child had been chewed by some fiendish teeth, upon the soft flesh of the back of the thigh. This was very horror to my own eyes." These two quotations introduce the Evil. They start off the thesis because they start letting the reader know and be aware that the warriors are recognizing a challenge will be belayed upon them in the future. This was also foreshadowing what could happen in the book. .
My second example that follows up the first, I believe was used to support the thesis, is "the mist." GOOD FEARING EVIL. On page 87, a noble was explaining to Ibn-Fadlan about the mist, " To the northmen, this means a mist that brings fiends who murder and kill and eat flesh of human beings- The mist is referred to many times in the book symbolising the evil that approached them. The mist monsters were the wendols. The northmen feared the mist since from the beginning as Herder states on page 88, "In the olden days, the black mist was feared by all northmen of every region." This mist represents the fear that good has on evil. Herger and the noble, in those two quotes, inform Ibn-Fadlan on the statuses that they were to receive.
