counterclockwise reviewed The Hitchhiker Trilogy by Douglas Adams
Easy to read
5 stars
Playfully cerebral, not too much work. A nice bedtime / morning read.
Paperback
English language
Published Jan. 25, 2019 by Picador Books.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: One Thursday lunchtime the Earth gets unexpectedly demolished to make way for a new hyperspace bypass. For Arthur Dent, who has only just had his house demolished that morning, this seems already to be more than he can cope with. Sadly, however, the weekend has only just begun, and the Galaxy is a very strange and startling place.
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe: The Restaurant at the End of the Universe provides the ultimate gastronomic experience, and for once there is no morning after to worry about.
Life, the Universe and Everything: In consequence of a number of stunning catastrophes, Arthur Dent is surprised to find himself living in a hideously miserable cave on prehistoric Earth. However, just as he thinks that things cannot get possibly worse, they suddenly do. He discovers that the Galaxy is not only mind-boggingly …
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: One Thursday lunchtime the Earth gets unexpectedly demolished to make way for a new hyperspace bypass. For Arthur Dent, who has only just had his house demolished that morning, this seems already to be more than he can cope with. Sadly, however, the weekend has only just begun, and the Galaxy is a very strange and startling place.
The Restaurant at the End of the Universe: The Restaurant at the End of the Universe provides the ultimate gastronomic experience, and for once there is no morning after to worry about.
Life, the Universe and Everything: In consequence of a number of stunning catastrophes, Arthur Dent is surprised to find himself living in a hideously miserable cave on prehistoric Earth. However, just as he thinks that things cannot get possibly worse, they suddenly do. He discovers that the Galaxy is not only mind-boggingly big and bewildering but also that most of the things that happen in it are staggeringly unfair.
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish: Just when Arthur Dent's sense of reality is at its most clouded, he suddenly finds the girl of his dreams. He finds her in the last place in the Universe in which he would expect to find anything at all, but which 3,976,000,000 people will find oddly familiar. They go in search of God's Final Message to His Creation and, in a dramatic break with tradition, actually find it.
Mostly Harmless: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy has, in what we laughingly call the past, a great deal to say on the subject of parallel universes.
None
5 stars
Always great fun everytime I read it!
Sean Randall reviewed The Hitchhiker Trilogy by Douglas Adams
Review of "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy Collection 5 Books Set by Douglas Adams" on 'Goodreads'
4 stars
It's been many years since I first heard the radio broadcast of this book. As a result of my initial experience with it, the characters' voices are fully-formed in my head, even when reading a book rather than listening. Naturally, this transcends the first volume, but I shall stick hereto for the benefit of my review.
It's also the case that, what I found amusing in my teens, now seems a little warn and overdone. Adams' repetition of certain phrases or the re-going over of certain points, for instance.
Two scenes vividly stood out for me during this reread: Eddie, singing his way to doom, was a scene from the radio drama which I found funny then and almost managed to replay in my head during this read. I love it dearly and it made me chortle to myself whilst washing a wine glass. The second one was Ford turning …
It's been many years since I first heard the radio broadcast of this book. As a result of my initial experience with it, the characters' voices are fully-formed in my head, even when reading a book rather than listening. Naturally, this transcends the first volume, but I shall stick hereto for the benefit of my review.
It's also the case that, what I found amusing in my teens, now seems a little warn and overdone. Adams' repetition of certain phrases or the re-going over of certain points, for instance.
Two scenes vividly stood out for me during this reread: Eddie, singing his way to doom, was a scene from the radio drama which I found funny then and almost managed to replay in my head during this read. I love it dearly and it made me chortle to myself whilst washing a wine glass. The second one was Ford turning into a penguin, which is also linked to the drama (the vocal on that also amused me greatly).
Of course, a lot of my retrospection is linked to the radio. As a stand alone novel, the ending is poor and the characters may seem shallow without the radiophonic or televisual background flushing out their personalities. Still, I enjoyed rereading it and it opens the way to what is indisputably a treasured series.
