2nd Quarter ORB Review

First of all, the following review is written for two books because, by themselves, they do not provide enough depth for the ORB Presentation guidelines. Now then, as fate would have it, Douglas Adams wrote the two books back to back, and the two could basically be combined into one novel. The protagonist in the two books is Arthur Dent, a mild-mannered human living on Earth when (conveniently) his home planet is in line to be destroyed to create a hyperspace freeway. This is pure irony being that his house was also planned to be destroyed for a non-hyperspace, every day Earth type of freeway. He is whisked away by his friend Ford Prefect, and the two “hitchhike” their way onto a starship. After an unfortunate discharge into open space via a Vogon airlock, the two meet Zaphod Beeblebrox (the President of the Galaxy, escaping from stealing a Golden spaceship) and a few others; and all of the characters go on some less than pleasant adventures.
“They’re those kind of books you just want to pick up and hug it to bits. The turns of phrases are so different, they throw you off the sentence and you have to read it again to fully appreciate it,” says Hannah Dooling of sffworld.com, “[The books] have provided endless hilarious days quoting it to my classmates and pissing off my teachers, who I have insisted to, that the answer to any of their questions is 42.”
For your information, these books were written by a man who was once admitted to a mental institution, and the books certainly reflect Adams’ randomness. His is truly an odd style of writing, full of twists and obscure references to aliens and planets unmentioned previously in the books. However, Adams maintains the fact that he is an Earthling and he does stay with a storyline. But, as also in his other books (Life, the Universe, and Everything/ So Long, and Thanks for all the Fish/ Mostly Harmless) the odd yet wonderfully composed sections about things us humans understand are hilarious.
“For instance, on the planet Earth, man had always assumed that he was more intelligent than dolphins because he had achieved so much - the wheel, New York, wars and so on - whilst all the dolphins had ever done was muck about in the water having a good time. But conversely, the dolphins had always believed that they were far more intelligent than man - for precisely the same reasons.Curiously enough, the dolphins had long known of the impending destruction of the planet Earth and had made many attempts to alert mankind to the danger; but most of their communications were misinterpreted as amusing attempts to punch footballs or whistle for tidbits, so they eventually gave up and left the Earth by their own means shortly before the Vogons arrived.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.” (113)
These books have provided a generation with a source for clever and spontaneous writing. I particularly enjoyed these two books, and am currently reading the rest of the “trilogy”. I strongly recommend readers to indulge in these books, especially if you enjoy complete absurdity. Even though Mr. Adams is now dead, he knew the meaning of life: 42.