The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (H2G2) follows an earthling, Arthur Dent, as he is introduced to galactic hitchhiking by a Betegeusian named Ford Prefect. This duo joins the other sole-remaining human and the Galactic president aboard a stolen ship. Along with a chronically depressed robot, the group gets to the bottom of life’s grandest questions.

I just finished re-reading this book. I wouldn’t have figured there was any reason to review a 34-year-old book. To my knowledge, there isn’t another movie in the works. Surely, everyone who is likely to read it already has, right? Young people like new stuff, and if you’re… let’s say… youthfulness-challenged and haven’t gotten around to it then it’s probably not your cup of tea (which, sad so say, means you are likely devoid of a sense of humor.)

Then I saw a “best in 2012” list by genre, and H2G2 was on it. Yes, I realize that “best-seller” lists are a euphemism for “most-printed” and are not a perfect indicator. Of course, when I went to look for said list, I was unable to re-discover it. It may have been the “top 20 books used to prop up the corner of a coffee table” for all I can prove. However, in looking for the list, I did find H2G2 on a lot of other lists including best-selling books of all time and most popular sci-fi of all time.

In short, read this book.

I don’t want to give a lot of spoilers, but here are just a few of the things H2G2 will do for you:

-It tells you the answer to life, the universe, and everything. (Now everything else will be anti-climactic and thus stress-free.)

-You’ll never look at a mouse the same way.

-It tells you what you need in order to hitchhike through the Milky Way (Spoiler alert: a towel.)

What more could one want from a book? (If you say vampires or zombies, I’ll choke you through your USB port.)

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