My friends started to crack jokes from this book and quote lines from it, and I started to get a little frustrated since I didn't know what they were talking about. So I decided to read the book for myself and find out.
It was one heck of a ride.
Its starts off with Arthur Dent, the protagonist of the book and series, whose house is just about to be destroyed for the construction of a bypass. As it turns out, it doesn't matter because the Earth is about to be destroyed to make way for a hyperspace bypass. Weird? Wait till you read the rest of the book.
Arthur and his friend, Ford Prefect (a field researcher to the famous book- The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy), hitch a ride on a Vorgon spacecraft. They are found and are subjected to a painful experience of Vorgon poetry (which is also painful to read) before being thrown out into space. They are then picked up by Zaphod Beeblebrox, who has stolen the Heart of Gold spaceship. Zaphod is accompanied by Trillian and the ever depressed robot, Marvin.
They land up on a deserted planet, Magrathea, which used to construct luxury planets. Here, Arthur meets a native, Slartibartfast (what a mouthful). He learns that the Earth was a super computer constructed by Magrathea at the special request of mice to give a question to the answer 42. This is the Answer predicted by a super-supercomputer Deep Thought when he was asked to calculate the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything.
However, just five minutes before the Earth was about to finish it's calculations, the Vorgons blew it up. So the mice needed Arthur since they he is the last things to survive from Earth and may contain the answer (I mean question). They offer to buy Arthur's brain, which he declines (I wonder why...). They start fighting. Suddenly klaxons all over the planet sound and Arthur, Trillian and Zaphod are able to escape.
But then two officers of the galactic police arrive to arrest Zaphod. The officers die. Why? Because Marvin was talking to their ship's computer, which got so depressed that it committed suicide, causing the officers' life support systems to fail.
The group decides to go to The Restaurant at the End of the Universe for lunch.
I've read plenty of 'funny' books, but this one was the first to actually make me laugh. And I mean laught out loud and not just inside my head.
This is a book that can take away all stress. It can be read anywhere, at any time. Its outrageous. Its random. Its improbable. Its..., I've run out of words.
Anyway, this is a must read for anyone. Although a lot of people have already read it. Heck, I must be one of the last to read it. Well, now I'm definitely going to read the other four books soon.
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