It's a sort of electronic book. It tells you eveything you need to know about anything. That's its job. [...] Which is exactly the sort of thing you need to know if you are an impoverished hitchhiker trying to see the marvels of the Universe for less than thirty Altairan dollars a day.

Anybody can have a brilliant idea for a good story, but it takes hard work and dedication to transform it into a magnum opus of satirical science-fiction. According to legend, Adams was lying on his back, pennyless and with a beer in his hand, somewhere down Innsbruck valley, gazing up at the starry night, thinking how great it would be to keep on hitchhiking all the way up there among the stars. The story may even be true, I don't give a hoot one way or another. I'm just grateful for the result of this flight of fancy that was first put together as a BBC radio show and later written down in a series of novels.

This here is a revisit, after almost thirty years, from my own hitchhiking youth to the current soft middle age comfortable armchair. I was afraid I would find the text silly, and there is enough inside that is chaotic and playful and improvisational, but there is also the "Heart of Gold" of the artist captured for eternity and beyond - the exuberant energy, the sense of wonder and the acid observations of human folly (making us understand we are not at the top of the evolution ladder is sort of the point if the exercise). In the introduction, Neil Gaiman refers to the author as : "tall, affable, smiling gently at a world that baffled and delighted him.", and it is this image that I see as I picture myself the hero of the journey, the Earthman Arthur Dent, who is send tumbling out into the universe one fine morning, as bulldozers gather around his modest home while up in the sky Vogonian spaceships are waiting to obliterate the Earth.

Arthur Dent finds himself marooned in space, with only an electronic guide book for wisdom and solace, but that is after all the human condition, and without a sense of humour we would have probably have slit our common throats before now. So listen to the words of wisdom printed on the good book, and get ready for the adventure of a lifetime:

... he also had a device that looked rather like a large electronic calculator. This had about a hundred tiny flat press buttons and a screen about four inches square on which any one of a million "pages" could be summoned at a moment's notice. It looked insanely complicated, and this was one of the reasons why the snug plastic cover it fitted into had the words DON'T PANIC printed on it in large friendly letters.

The plot is absurd and episodic, relying on word games, dramatic developments and wacky characters. The Brits have transformed this type of satire into an art form, starting with P G Wodehouse, who is cited as an influence by Adams, and continuing with Blackadder, Monty Python Flying Circus, Fawlty Towers and more recent shows like Red Dwarf. The Hitchhiker's Guide belongs in this Hall of Fame of intelligent and subversive entertainment, indeed it could be said to be one of the foundation stones of the whole edifice. Any attempt to explain and to describe the characters out of context is doomed for failure on my part, you simply have to be there to understand the importance of the towel in the career of Ford Perfect, the researcher-editor of the Guide; to be crushed by the ego of Zaphod Beeblebrox, president of the Galactic Council ("adventurer, ex-hippie, good-timer (crook? quite possibly), manic self-publisher, terrible bad at personal relationships, often thought to be completely out to lunch.") ; to design fjords with Slartibartfast or to sigh at the pointlessness of existence with Marvin the Paranoid Android:

Pardon me for breathing, which I never do anyway so I don't know why I bother to say it, oh God, I'm so depressed. Here's another of those self-satisfied doors. Life! Don't talk to me about life.

Suffice to say I had a great time revisiting the novel, and that I even found some interesting actual sci-fi concepts among the jokes and the satirical sketches. The Guide is very much like a smartphone with acces to Wikipedia, and The Infinite Probability Drive is a cool plot device, allowing the adveturers to travel from one corner of the universe to the other in a blink of an eye ("... we will be restoring normality just as soon as we are sure what is normal anyway."), but it was the description of motion detectors in entertainment devices that really rang a bell:

For years radios had been operated by means of pressing buttons and turning dials; then as the technology became more sophisticated the controls were made touch-sensitive - you merely had to brush the panels with your fingers; now all you had to do was wave your hand in the general direction of the components and hope. It saved a lot of muscular expenditure, of course, but meant that you had to sit infuriantingly still if you wanted to keep listening to the same program.

The first book in the series ends on a cliffhanger, so I guess I have to hold on to the "a nicely chilled Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster in my hand." and hitchhike in the Heart of Gold to the next destination for Arthur Dent and his friends. Until we get to the Restaurant at the End of the Universe:

... we'll be saying a big hello to all intelligent life forms everywhere ... and to everyone else out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together, guys.

Read for the Second Time on March 18, 2012

Rating: 3 stars! (After 3 years, I still liked it!)

Six hundred books... 3 years... in between. Me not being really a sci-fi fan. But, yes...I still liked this book!

Resistance is useless! says the outer space alien who first apprehended Arthur Dent and Ford Prefect. I might as well not resist. My group here in Goodreads, Filipinos, love this book as they voted it as one of their 100 Favorite Books.

I appreciate the creativity and imagination of Douglas Adams for thinking that Earth is actually a big computer that is designed to give the Ultimate Question to the Ultimate Answer divulged in the book: "42." There are also references to Christianity like in the introduction where "the man nailed unto a cross" and Deep Thought mimicking St. John the Baptist preparing the way to the "greater one" (Earth symbolizing Jesus Christ). Who says that sci-fi cannot be appropriate as a Lenten Read?

My favorite character in this book is that soldier who does not know why he is doing his job and why is he shouting "Resistance is useless!" I also do not know why I reread this book and why I have this strong urge of knowing the Ultimate Question so I have to read the 4 other books in this "trilogy."

Resistance is useless!


Read for the First Time on June 15, 2009

Rating: 3 stars! (I liked it!). Review below:

This is a fascinating sci-fi novel. In 1979, it started as a radio program, became a TV series and a stage play. The author died in 2001 and as a tribute to him, the movie was shown in 2005. I am not a big fan of science fictions in book forms but I grew up liking Darna, Zimatar, Magnun, Lastikman, Panday, atbp as komiks (there was no electricity in the province so we did not have access to television) and AM radio were the handiest forms of entertainment when I was growing up in the province. So, reading this book brought me back to those days when I was tremendously hooked in sci-fi believing that there could really be a stone that when you swallow, you can become a superhero without choking or needing a doctor to operate your colon later.

I picked up this book two years ago after receiving an email from a British colleague in the UK. He was saying goodbye and his last sentence was “So long and thanks for all the fish!” I wrote him back asking what it meant and he explained that it was from this book. I postponed reading this after finishing less than 5 pages of the book as I found British humor not really funny. There was the transcript of interviews for the movie casts and screenwriter at the end of this edition and one of them said that his daughter literally fell off her chair laughing while reading the novel. Maybe I am already old and obviously not a Briton but I finished this book in less than 48 hours and was able to sleep well (without nightmares unlike when I was reading the holocaust novels). Although I felt happy and light so I am not that old yet I guess.

The fish BTW is said to be contradicting the existence of God. As you have to put this fish – a Babel fish – for you to understand any language. I found it funny (which was not in the first 5 pages) and not sacrilegious as the Mary Magdalene being Jesus’ wife brouhaha that made the Catholic Church call for boycott during the promotion of The Vinci Code movie in 2005. I fish swimming inside your ear!

There are other funny and witty ideas in the book like the Earth as a big computer designed to answer The Ultimate Question on Life, Universe and Everything with the Ultimate Answer as 42. I have already lined up the 2nd (The Restaurant at the End of the Universe) and 3rd (Life, Universe and Everything) books in my bookshelf as a To Reads later this year. I wish to complete by getting the last two (So Long and Thanks for All The Fish and Almost Harmless) as I would like to see how Douglas (May God bless his witty and talented soul) tied up 42 with the existential questions!

This is one of those books that I had been meaning to read for ages and thanks to my awesome friend, Roya, I finally did. I will be honest, this is one of those books that I couldn’t have finished by myself. Thanks Roya!

As a big fan of science-fiction, I felt obligated to read this book. This book is a classic and so many of my friends love it that I just had to try. However, I knew I might need help for reading this for two personal reasons. First, I am too used to a serious tone in my science-fiction stories. Science-fiction and humor in one book? Fascinating and a little hard to believe. I wasn’t sure this combo could even work. Second, I don’t easily laugh. Almost 90% of books and 98% of movies that are supposed to be very humorous and funny, only succeed in making me smile.

Now this book's introduction actually managed to make me laugh several times! The introduction raised my hopes and I started to look forward to the story. Unfortunately, I found the beginning of the story boring and I had to drag myself through it. As I continued to read, I kept wondering, where is the appeal? How come so many of my friends love this? Why is this book SUCH A BIG DEAL? I thought perhaps it's necessary to read the entire series. I reminded myself that sometimes the first book is more like a pilot episode and the series gets better as it continues.

I did love Arthur as the main character and I specially loved his reactions to all the madness. But I didn’t really care for all the other characters that were running around. Except Marvin. He was awesome too.

While I think the author has a very nice sense of humor, I didn’t find the story that hilarious. But the book IS filled with witty and memorable sayings and these sayings were one of my motivations to continue. Eventually I got so far into the story that I couldn’t leave it unfinished since I was very curious about several intertwining plots. I am sorry to say the book ended very abruptly and the story was left unfinished. I was like…what the hell did I just read?

So...I didn’t love this book while reading it. I didn’t enjoy it that much either. Many events were just a little too random for me. I actually really love nonsense stories that have their own unique logic, like "Alice in Wonderland" or "Howl's moving castle" but I had a hard time finding any kind of logic in many parts of this story. All the Petunias and whale sperms were just too random.

So…why 4 stars?

I actually started to really like this book when I finished it and got around to thinking about it. The thing is, this book was first published in 1979. I completely forgot this tiny important detail when I was looking in the story for the appeal. With this in mind, I came to see the ingenuity of the author.

I am sure there are people that find Startrek: the original series very silly and don’t pay much attention to the depth of the stories and their messages. I love this series and while I too laugh at many scenes that really are funny to today’s viewers, I also take this series very seriously. Startrek was a visionary series at the time of its creation and the same applies to Hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy.

“To boldly split infinitives that no man had split before... “

This books contains many visionary elements, from electronic books, holograms and computers networked together to usable portable information devices and touch-sensitive objects. Even the guide, the book inside the book, is very similar to Wikipedia, a database full of instantly available information. The artificial intelligences like Marvin, the depressed paranoid Android and Eddie, the spaceship’s mind are very unique and memorable. The quotes and sayings that I mentioned above also play an important role in my rating. Many of them are unique, witty and simply unforgettable. Here are a few famous examples:

…"In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move."

…"Would it save you a lot of time if I just gave up and went mad now?"

…"The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't."

…“‘You know,’ said Arthur, ‘it's at times like this, when I'm trapped in a Vogon airlock with a man from Betelgeuse, and about to die of asphyxiation in deep space that I really wish I'd listened to what my mother told me when I was young.’
‘Why, what did she tell you?’
‘I don't know, I didn't listen.’”

…“Arthur: If I asked you where the hell we were, would I regret it?
Ford: We're safe.
Arthur: Oh good.
Ford: We're in a small galley cabin in one of the spaceships of the Vogon Constructor Fleet.
Arthur: Ah, this is obviously some strange use of the word safe that I wasn't previously aware of.”

…“The President of the Universe holds no real power. His sole purpose is to take attention away from where the power truly exists...”

…“Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?”

The plot IS too random and some events ARE too silly, but all the visionary elements, great quotes and funny commentary on human behavior and society, make it worth reading.

So...give this book a try if you are a big fan of science-fiction and want to read the classics. Give this book a try even if you are like me and might not find this story very humorous. Do keep in mind how old this book actually is and that it started out as radio broadcasts.

Don’t look too hard for logic. In this book, the universe is a joke and that’s kind of the whole point of the story.

“The last ever dolphin message was misinterpreted as a surprisingly sophisticated attempt to do a double-backwards-somersault through a hoop whilst whistling the 'Star Spangled Banner', but in fact the message was this: So long and thanks for all the fish.”

Douglas Adams’ bestselling book The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy published in 1979 is witty, occasionally complex, and accessible to the average reader. The protagonist, Arthur Dent, is a befuddled Englishman and his friend, Ford Prefect, is a hitchhiking alien doing research for the latest edition of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. The two narrowly escape destruction with the rest of planet Earth when Ford catches wind of its impending demolition by intergalactic civil servants and beams them to the nearest accessible spaceship--the Vogon demolition fleet’s mothership. Inside, they encounter murdered mattresses, ruthless bureaucrats, and torture by poetry. They are soon ejected into space and twenty-nine seconds later (one second short of death), the president of the universe and his girlfriend rescue them in their recently stolen state-of-the-art spaceship, The Heart of Gold. In the remaining pages, Adams prioritizes unpacking the absurdity of bureaucracy, politics, and religion over a strong plot and whimsically manipulates grammar and rhetoric to inspire in the reader a sense of his disregard for the possibility of any sense or meaning to life.
Entries peppered throughout the book from the “real” The Hitchhiker’s Guide inform the reader of non-essential historical, cultural, and always humorous tidbits about the universe and its inhabitants. For example, the popular drink the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster makes the drinker feel like their brain is being “smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped round a large gold brick” (Ch 2). Ford hopes to update the electronic guide with how one can see the wonders of the universe for 30 Altarian dollars a day, but due to being stuck on Earth for 15 years his signature contribution remains his description of Earth as “mostly harmless”. Arthur Dent is more the butt of every joke than the hero of the story and simply plays the role of baffled human encountering the unknown. The president, Zaphod Beeblebrox, who happens to be Ford’s cousin, has two heads, three arms, and the ego of a true politician. He steals almost everyone’s thunder, but that’s probably because, while only six people know it, he’s succeeding phenomenally at his presidential mandate of distracting everyone’s attention away from power instead of wielding it. Zaphod is accompanied by his human girlfriend, Trillian, who acts as the token female character in the typically male-dominated sci-fi tale. Smart and sexy, she is mostly disregarded by her boyfriend while dutifully following him into every folly. Marvin is a pet robot of sorts with a serious depression problem which proves to have tremendous utility.
On account of the Heart of Gold’s Infinite Improbability Drive, the serendipitous crew encounters and escapes from a series of unthinkable situations, the most notable being the discovery of the fabled planet of Magrathea. Believed to now be dead, it supposedly designed and constructed luxury planets at the behest of ultra-wealthy clients until closing up shop with the collapse of the intergalactic economy some ten million years ago. At this point in the book a loosely coherent plot begins to emerge. After narrowly evading the planet’s automatic defense missiles, the crew land the Heart of Gold on the surface and Zaphod leads the bunch on a hunt for the unfathomable riches he is certain must be hidden there... somewhere. Instead, he comes to a shocking realization about the key to his wildly successful career of misconduct, Arthur learns of the mysterious nature and fate of his late beloved Earth, Trillian loses her two pet mice, and Marvin unwittingly saves everyone’s lives just by being himself.
Adams playfully goads the reader closer and closer into agreeing that “The Universe is almost certainly being run by a bunch of maniacs” (Ch 31) by poking fun at bureaucracy and politics with amusing analogies. Much like the local bureaucrat trying to tear down Arthur’s house, the Vogons respond to Earthlings’ protests before imminent destruction by stating, “All the planning charts and demolition orders have been displayed in your local planning department in Alpha Centauri for fifty of your Earth years” (Ch 3). Zaphod Beeblebrox is the posterchild for theatrical two-faced politics. His wild antics make him the most successful president in history and he possesses two heads, and therefore two faces, one of which is more popular than the other (Ch 4).
Adams then picks apart religion and philosophy without being overtly insulting due to his use of their very own arguments. A small but exceedingly sophisticated fish proves God’s existence and is therefore the final and clinching proof of his nonexistence. God “promptly vanishes in a puff of logic” because “without faith I am nothing” (Ch 6). Philosophers protest the creation of a supercomputer they fear will put them out of a job if it is able to answer the questions of the Universe, thus they demand the “total absence of solid facts” (Ch 25). Adams’ deft criticism of these topics threatens to elicit not much more than a self-deprecating chuckle from the very people he is poking fun at.
Absurd similes and outrageous statements infuse the writing style with charming humor while occasionally reminding the reader that reality can in fact be quite ridiculous. “For a few seconds Ford seemed to ignore him, and stared fixedly into the sky like a rabbit trying to get run over by a car” (Ch 1), and, “The ships hung in the sky much the same way that bricks don’t” (Ch 3), are clearly very foolish things to say, yet confer upon the reader a precise picture of the given situation that Adams wants them to have. In a similar vein, a police ship commits suicide after hearing Marvin’s depressing view of the universe (Ch 34), letters of the alphabet can be “friendly” (Ch 1) or “unfriendly” (Ch 34), and the answer to life, the universe and everything is simply the number “42” (Ch 27). Adams makes clear to the reader exactly how seriously he takes his subject matter.
Poking fun at politics and religion and making ludicrous statements are the more obvious of Adams’ tactics to discourage the reader from taking life, or really anything, very seriously. Less obvious, but equally effective, is his manipulation of grammar and rhetoric. By rendering the familiar structure of language malleable in his expert hands, he reminds the reader at every turn that all is not as it seems. He breaks commonly accepted rules of writing by blatantly using redundant vocabulary and pairing oxymoronic words. Arthur wakes up blearily then gets up and wanders blearily around his room (Ch 1), Ford Prefect is not conspicuously tall and his features are striking but not conspicuously handsome (Ch 1), and Zaphod rides a thoroughly ridiculous form of transport, but a thoroughly beautiful one (Ch 4). The windows on Arthur’s soon to be destroyed home are “of a size and proportion which more or less exactly failed to please the eye” (Ch 1), and there is something “very slightly odd” about Ford Prefect (Ch 1). With these deviances from the norm and by slipping in a clever grammar joke here and there, “...to boldly split infinitives that no man had split before” (Ch 15), Adams taunts the grammar police and then scoffs when their powerlessness and lack of creativity are exposed. By deftly rendering malleable the familiar institution of language, Adams bring home his deeper message that societal constructs are the mere product of a human desire to invent order out of chaos.
While Adams can boast a nimble sense of humor and a clever mind, obvious plot holes emerge as the story progresses. For example, the Vogons dump Arthur and Ford millions of lightyears away from Earth but then Trillian and Zaphod pick them up in the same vector as Earth. This could be due to the fact that Adams was a legendary procrastinator who would often leave manuscripts unfinished until the last minute. His biographer, M.J. Simpson, author of Hitchhiker: A Biography of Douglas Adams says that Adams also had problems following the traditional structure of a story. He shares that, “Adams was good at writing beginnings, middles, and endings, but when he got to the middle he’d thought of another good beginning and wanted to write that instead of the ending”. Adams’ habit of making things up as he went along is uncomfortably apparent to the reader who craves consistency and resolution, especially from a book some say holds a place in the sci-fi genre. Therefore, his book might more accurately fall under the category of comic science fiction.
While he falls short of producing the next great science fiction series of our time, Adams succeeds remarkably in demonstrating how a truly inquisitive mind works. He breaks the rules of fiction writing, but rather than being his downfall, these bold deviations add to his appeal. By weaving together intelligence, humor, and slapstick, he reaches a broad audience without sacrificing his unique voice and underlying message. So much so that the reader is left almost certain that “the chances of finding out what really is going on are so absurdly remote that the only thing to do is to say hang sense of it and just keep yourself occupied” (Ch 30).

Amazing book might be my new favourite. Great size of the book too and I love the cover

A masterpiece in deed. This book had me laughing by myself through every single page. The humor, the characters and all the events that happen around them keeps you engage in a universe fill with absurdity. The same kind of two absurdity one finds in our own home-planet.

This book is a must read according to Elon Musk. Although I’m admittedly not a science fiction fan, there some parts that are amusing. A quick enjoyable read.

Bought it on a whim and don't regret it a bit
Could have been chaper for the quality of the book
The spine gets a split on it during my second read

“But the story of this terrible, stupid Thursday, the story of its extraordinary consequences, and the story of how these consequences are inextricably intertwined with this remarkable book begins very simply. It begins with a house.” The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams is the first in it’s series, also made into a movie. The sheer weirdness of this book is unexplainable for one to understand without reading it. It plays with the kind of humor where everything is so random that your mind feels it is comical. Also, this book is truly not the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy itself, but rather, as it explains in the exposition, a book about the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and those who are using it.
The story, at first, seems normal as a narrator tells us about a man getting his house knocked down. The reality slowly fades, as random names and phrases that the narrator uses are seeming very un-Earth like. It is present day, or around this time, and first set in London, England. Soon after, the setting turns into a fantasy, yet not impossible, world of aliens around our galaxy that we never knew. It jumps into this turn fairly quickly, and persuades you to keep reading with the constant action and suspense. Then, there are the characters. “The thing that used to worry him most was the fact that people always used to ask him what he was looking so worried about.” Our main character; Arthur Dent. Arthur is the one real character in the story that can be related to or understood by us, the human people of Earth. A stubborn, normal, fed up human that is always confused or questioning things in all the madness of the plot. Ford Prefect, Zaphod Beeblebrox, Marvin-all know what is going on in this crazy world since they are a part of it. A women named Trilian brings a mother character to the book, being human aswell but always caring and responsible during the adventure. These main characters are the protagonists, and the entirety of their journey is the antagonist. They all seem to be in search for something, but each character doesn’t really understand what it is or how to find it.
In the beginning, all Arthur cares about is his house. Shortly after, his house and everything around it aren’t his biggest problem. His home planet of Earth went through a dramatic change, from full of life to non-existent. His best pal Ford, who was secretly not from Earth himself, decided to rescue Arthur from his death. This spirals to extreme coincidences and near death-experiences as they hitchhike their way through space. They later get picked up by the president of the Universe, Zaphod Beeblebrox, and his two helpers Trillian and Marvin. They are now searching for the legendary planet of Magrathea, which was told to have been creating planets as luxury items. The ship searches, and discovers, the hidden planet, but finding the true treasures are harder than they appear. The randomness of their adventures and the narrations throughout the novel show a genius way of connecting these facts and instances into one story that captivates the reader. The erratic events somehow create a normality. It brings the reader into the story, teaches and explains all the events and ideas, and gives flashbacks so all the facts come together into one plot.
While reading this, every chapter has something that would make me laugh or force me to press forward in the book. Adams achieved his goal, finally bringing us a children’s book for adults. When explaining this to someone, it sounds like you are reading a kindergarten’s story. But when actually reading it, the elements of description and hidden pieces of the story somehow make the overall book feel more mature and more deep. I loved the sudden and random way he would explain, almost over explain, all the details in the story. Though you could say he was droning on and on, the way he does this helps the story seem more clear through the insanity.  I enjoyed the comical way that Adams used to describe who people are without even the character itself knowing about it. Mr. Prosser, the man trying to knock down Arthur’s house, was shown to us as this; “Curiously enough, though he didn’t know it, he was also a direct male-line descendant of Genghis Khan..” The story later tells that the stubby male called Mr. Prosser gets very vivid, but violent, war scenes in his memory every now and then. Adams later uses this to explain Mr. Prosser’s thoughts and feeling about what he does or how he lives. Interesting ways that Adams shows his characters are far from normal, but far from normal is perfect for me and I appreciated it immensely. My favorite thing about the characters was having Arthur as the main focus. Arthur is the rock, the glue, the sanity of the entire story. I related to him myself, and he keeps you in focus during the book. Though I was thrilled with these parts of the book, sadly not every story is perfect. Compared to the roaring events of the rest of the story, the ending just didn’t meet my expectations. There just wasn’t enough action in it like the rest of the story, but I could see how a tranquil ending would wrap up all the crazy events in the book.
Adams has a very unique style, and it would seem to work with young adults who find themselves not usually enjoying reading books. It has that childish setting and overall feel, but with mature ways of writing. A younger child may enjoy the fun setting but have trouble sticking to the plot, so a more young adult would suit it better. The Hitchhiker Guide to the Galaxy is a comical, interesting book that would be great for anyone who likes science fiction or fantasies.

Si no te lo has leído aún no entenderás muchas cosas sobre la ciencia ficción y la cultura de hoy, es muy divertido y merece mucho la pena leerlo, da igual si tienes 15 o 40 años

42.
A really important book. Very well written and full of fun and Improbability.