I wish Douglas was still alive just to see how far technology has come. He would have had a badass podcast.

Hitchhiker (2003) - M. J. Simpson

Biography of Douglas Adams, principally known for creating The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but beyond that an early innovator in the use of multiple media in popular entertainment, with a wide variety of creation.

On an absolute split second impulse i picked up this book. Adams was an incredibly creative person and i am interested in his process and personality. The book does a good job unraveling the origins of some of Adams' ideas.

Interesting to see the various places in Adams' life that his creativity spilled forth. He was interested in and expressed himself across multiple forms of media -- radio, books, tv, computer games, stage, the internet and movies. He was an amateur musician and an early user of personal computers, both things he pursued with passion.

It's also informing to get some understanding on the personality aspects that would both lead him to his creativity and then stifle it at the same time.

I found it striking how he came, cleverly into contact with so many other famous and popular creative people so early in his life.

I was entertained with the early Hitchhiker's stuff, in its time. I heard the radio show and then read the books. This book showed me how much broader were Douglas Adams' abilities and how confining the commercial and monetary forces can be upon a creative person. Some of those forces would encircle at least a part of Adams' creativity into popular entertainment and comedy. Douglas often chose to redo the same material across various media - radio, to book, to tv, to computer games, to stage, to radio again, to tv again, to movies. Where previously most creators stick to creating new material in one media, and within that face commercial pressure to be pegged and repeat with similar creation in that same media.

Simpson wrote this book shortly after Adams death -- it's interesting how quickly perspectives on this can change in just the few years since 2003.

ASIDE: For math nerds like me, something i learned in this book: Why 42? -> 101010b! So it follows two and ten in that way.

ALSO: Discovered that Adams was an early computer user, his first computer was a DEC Rainbow. That made me feel good -- i was on the development team that created the Rainbow in the very early 80's. Good to think i could have done something creative for Mr. Adams. (So you see i also faced those same narrowing commercial forces.)

AND A PLUS: I never knew about and now really like the website: h2g2.com

I've rounded up to 3 stars from 2.5 - I'm not sure I learnt a huge amount that I hadn't read elsewhere. I found the early part of the book almost turgid with irrelevant detail, although it improved when dealing with his post-school/university career and what he was doing when he was - mostly - not meeting deadlines. That said, there are better books on Adams/H2G2 available.

It's a great glimpse behind the creation of Hitchhiker's, Dirk Gently. Douglas Adams was wickedly funny and incredibly complex, and all of this comes out in Hitchhiker.

Even though I knew exactly how it ended, it was still very sad.

I love Doug Adams' writing, and was hoping to learn about him as a writer and a person. I think I might have been better served to choose Neil Gaiman's "Don't Panic" for this instead.

I found this book to be rather tedious. I wanted to come away from the book with insight into Douglas's beliefs, personality, and inner workings, but instead, I came away with a head full of dates and statistics and names names names names names.

I forced myself to keep reading, but really didn't find the book interesting until the last couple of chapters.

I've enjoyed Douglas Adams's books for a long time. I grew up reading The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, and even Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency, and have always been impressed with Adams's humor, intelligence and imagination.

This biography was an informative book about one of my favorite authors, but definitely more for a British audience than for an American one. I knew a few of the big names mentioned in the book, but there were many (too many, despite the name reference in the back) that I didn't know. A positive point about the book was that the author was able to get to the truth behind several of Adams's oft-repeated (and slightly inaccurate) anecdotes. A negative is that it was focused more on dragging the reader through an interminable succession of this-happened-then-this-happened than giving any insight into Adams's writing.

The last book of Douglas Adams material was published under the name the The Salmon of Doubt. It is a hodgepodge including stores, essays and incomplete work by Douglas Adams. It also portrays an interesting man with a great sense of humor. MJ Simpson's Hitchhiker a Biography of Douglas Adams does not leave you with an image of the same man.

Much of this biography I liked. I had had no idea of Douglas Adams's life but I was a fan of most of his writings. I bought this book at a used bookstore for a fraction of its list price and I suppose I got my money's worth. I left this book with a sense that much was missing. The text includes name dropping about the people who liked and admired and socialized with Douglas Adams and not very much of why these people would admire Douglas Adams.

The Hitchhiker did much to explain the 25 year effort by Douglas Adams to make a movie made of his famous Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy (yes it is a five book series but only about three books of good stories). For all of the coverage given to the business of buying and selling the movie rights, of preparing and rewriting scripts and flying to different movie lots; one still has a sense that this story has not been fully told - thereby capturing my attitude towards the entire biography.

The famous Douglas Adams story of the packets of cookies at London airport is all but debunked with the insistence that Adams made it up and became so enamored of it he continue to use it. One of the best Adams quotations in the book is "I love deadlines they make such a whooshing sound as they blow by" captures something of the humor of Adams but it is frequently used to criticize his work habits and by the end of the book loses its humor. I would've loved and wider variety of humorous quips from a man who loved playing with words.

And this goes to the heart of the problem with the Hitchhiker; the underlying humor and broad-spectrum curiosity of this very intelligent if somewhat peripatetic man is rendered in faint praise.

This is probably a 3.5 star review rounded up mostly by fondness for Adams. With this book I have a better sense of some of the facts of this author's life but only a vague sense of his spirit. I am glad I have read this book. I'm glad I did not pay the full price for this book and I would hope that someone with a greater interest in the human side will write a better biography of this man. Douglas Adams at his best was a writer who loved banging together words to see and hear what they sounded like. His biographer should share that same love.

This biography of Douglas Adams tends to focus on his work and only briefly touches on his personal and private life. In many ways this and Nick Webb’s book, “Wish You Were Here” form a complimentary and more complete biography of Douglas. Both are well worth a read for all Douglas Adams fans

bought Hitchhiker : A Biography of Douglas Adams about a year ago; as I've been a fan of his works for over 20 years and I was looking forward to reading a biography of his. In true Adams style, I didn't get around to actually reading it until a week before the premiere of the long-awaited movie.

Simpson rides a very fine line at times between being a detailed biographer and a nitpicky fanboy. He delves into Adams' life, briefly discussing his childhood and then jumping directly into his school career. He seems to have interviewed nearly every classmate and teacher who would speak to him.. except for the infamous Paul Neil Milne Johnstone, aka "The Worst Poet in the Universe"; Simpson quotes some letters, but nothing more. Adams' early career is covered in detail as well - noting his peripheral involvement with the disbanded Pythons, the writing credits on various short-lived or one-off TV shows, and his eventual triumph with the Hitchhiker radio show/novel/TV show/computer game/breakfast cereal... and (finally!) movie.

The endnotes are extensive (bording on exhausting), and a couple of themes pop up over and over again: Adams' tendency to embellish his stories, and his procrastination. Apparently, the only way to get a finished work out of Douglas was to lock him up and glower until he was done. My impression is that his ideas overwhelmed him at times; his dilettante tendencies getting the better of him. He also seems to have had a pretty poor business sense - paying very little attention to the management of his assets, yet reviewing over and over again any of the creative work he produced or co-produced. I have a feeling that the movie would never have gotten produced if Adams were still around - he'd still be fiddling with bits here and there.

While Adams' story is pretty fascinating if not "very splendid and worthwhile" - Simpson's detailed retelling seems to suck some of the life out of it. I'd recommend Don't Panic by Neil Gaiman over this book - but froods who know where their towels are will probably want to read both.

A thoroughly researched and detailed biography. It’s written with short chapters (which I like) each dealing with a specific subject or discussion point. It’s not a volume of hero-worship and it doesn’t shy away from Douglas’ failings or quirks. But despite being fairly balanced about both Douglas and others in his life, the reader is left, at the end, with a sense of celebration, not sadness at an early death and the possibility of a life slightly unfulfilled. I guess the act’s because Douglas Noel Adams have so much to the world - and a lot more than just the Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy, in all its myriad forms.

Excellent bio of Douglas Adams that's worth reading just for the catalog of Adams' stock anecdotes that he used in interviews (the origin of the Hitchhiker's title, what really happened at his first book signing, the biscuits story, etc.). A critical look at the work of Adams and his achievements. Definitely recommended for Douglas Adams fans.