I had a few chuckles at this book. I don’t usually laugh out loud at books, but this one made me laugh quite a bit.

Mainly, it is so because of the narrator. I think I’ve said before how much I like when we have this kind of overt narrators, that give their opinion on the actions of the characters (I’ll add that this is a very British thing to do) and so on. The narrator here anticipates the story, retells the past and goes on.

The story at hand is that of Arthur Dent (played by Martin Freeman in the film adaptation, I’m sensing a pattern here), who, on the day of the end of the world, is taken on a trip by his neighbor, Ford Prefect. Ford is an investigator for The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, an excellent travel guide for those who roam the space.

When the story begins, Arthur Dent is fighting off a construction company who wants to demolish his house. A few moments later, the entire earth is demolished to make way for a space highway or something along those lines. One of my favorite parts was around that moment, when the Volgon announce the imminent demolition of the planet and they say that the information has been available for millions of years.

And then he learns that humans haven’t worked out intergalactic travel, he growls in frustration and goes destroying the planet.

But our good friend Arthur Dent was saved by Ford Prefect and by the time the Earth was shattered in a million pieces scattered around the galaxy, both guys have managed to smuggle themselves into a Volgian spaceship or something.

As they journey through the galaxy, they meet Trillian (a girl who is actually a human woman that Arthur met once at a party) and Zaphod Beeblebrox, who was the president of the galaxy and now is on the run with a stolen spaceship.

The book was fun and easy to read (after a full-load semester, that’s always a plus), and it did manage to make me laugh a little several times. Arthur is my favorite character, because it was so funny to read him trying to make sense to the new and senseless world he’s been thrown into. He’s a little like Alice as he travels through the galaxy of nonsense. Whenever I read him trying to use logic and reason, he was so funny. I want to read more about him, really. Trillian was another great one, with her being the normal one in her relation with Zaphod. He’s the crazy, spectacular one, and she’s level-headed and bookish. She’s a great female character, and clearly more than just an eye-candy or a love interest. And Ford is very endearing in his relation with Arthur (and Zaphod, but more with Arthur). The whole group is pretty fun and sweet.

I’m going to keep on reading this trilogy in five parts because I enjoyed this one a lot, and because of Arthur. He’s pretty awesome.