The Restaurant at the End of the Universe by Douglas Adams — Revisit Review

Cover: bookshop.org

^{Previous in the series: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.}

One of the advantages of actually reading Douglas Adams’ series book by book (and with a gap between each) is that I can form my opinion on each book individually, rather than simply knowing that I enjoy the overall amorphous series. The beginning of The Restaurant at the End of the Universe lacks the verve of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, though perhaps that’s because none of it was new to me. The total perspective vortex is a clever idea, but actually reading about Zaphod’s journey there was a little underwhelming.

Why should I make anything up? Life’s bad enough as it is without wanting to invent any more of it.

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, Douglas Adams

The section of the book that shines is the titular Restaurant at the End of the Universe: Milliways. Not only are the gang back together, but Ford’s drunken antics are amusing and vividly call to mind the excellent vocal performances of the radio version. The captain of the Golgafrincham B-Ark reminded me of a character in Tanz der Vampire, both of them preferring a bath to almost any other way of passing time.

It is folly to say you know what is happening to other people. Only they know, if they exist. They have their own universes of their eyes and ears.

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, Douglas Adams

It’s safe to say that I enjoyed my time in Douglas Adams’ universe. It particularly made me smile to be reminded of Hotblack Desiato and my astonishment when I walked past an estate agent in Camden of the same name. The prose is, always, perfectly quotable, even if there aren’t as many insights for me in this book as there are in some of the others. There are certain ticks of language that Douglas Adams uses which I’m sure influence the way I write and speak — it makes me wonder why nothing more recent has had the same effect.

Their songs are on the whole very simple and mostly follow the familiar theme of boy-being meets girl-being beneath a silvery moon, which then explodes for no adequately explored reason.

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, Douglas Adams

I’m looking forward to the remaining books in the series, especially those which have material not covered in the radio version.

⭐⭐⭐

Rating: 2.5 out of 5.

^{Next in the series: Life, the Universe and Everything.}