Michael Crichton writes realistic, near-future sci-fi and his books just captivate me. I can’t even really say why. This book is about a team of archaeologists excavating and reconstructing a French village from the 1300s. When they discover multiple anomalies with their site — chief among them being a modern eyeglass lens buried there — they are whisked off to the headquarters of the multinational multibillion-dollar corporation that sponsors their dig. There they learn that the company has the ability to go back in time, and that their help is needed to rescue their dig leader from that past. On their trip back, they learn a lot about the history of their site, and they have some adventures of their own