I find it incredibly odd that I hadn’t really heard anything about this book before despite the fact that I knew of its existence. Of course I’ve heard of the movie and I figured that it was a sad excuse for a true science fiction story and have thus far never bothered to see it. Now I can say that while I am glad not have seen the movie so that I had the chance to first read the book, I am very interested in watching it when I get a chance. I never realized how many things reference this book and after reading quite a bit of science fiction I can see a lot of ways that it has seemingly shaped the genre in many years since the Guide was published back in 1979.
This is by far the most comically written science fiction book I’ve ever read. It can be a bit confusing at times because it jumps around so much but it’s very entertaining. I’d almost compare it to Catch 22 in the way the book is written but I could be horribly wrong in my comparison since my memory of Catch 22 is from a single read-through five years ago.
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams is a different breed of science fiction from what I’m used to. Nothing has to be explained and even the explanations are usually nonsensical because that’s the way the book was designed. Things don’t have to make sense or even be remotely plausible which makes it a fun book to read. From start to finish this book barely lasted me two days and it’s mostly because it’s just a fun read.
While I suspect I’ll remember the general nature of the novel and it will be near impossible to forget the joking tone the actual details of the story are likely to be less memorable to me because of the somewhat random nature of the book. So while I guess it was an enjoyable book to read and I would recommend it, I’m not really that crazy about it because I enjoy more realistic hard science fiction books. So overall, I’d give it a high rating but it’s not really my type of book.
7.5/10
