The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

“The answer is 42” that is perhaps my favorite quote from all the books I’ve read.  I was looking for a book that’s funny and enjoyable for a youth audience. That’s when I came across this book. This book is the first installment of “a trilogy in five parts” it is a science fiction book that is very funny but quite unique in style.

The humor of this novel is not that of the outrageous, laugh out loud type. It uses satire and irony at a galactic scale to poke fun at pretty much everything in life. An example of this humor can be found in just about every page. The humor is very intelligent and is often backed up by science.

So basically one day, during lunch, an alien fleet arrives demolished our planet to make room for a hyperspace bypass (this event is foreshadowed in a very funny way). It is quite lucky for our protagonist that his friend –an unemployed actor- is actually a galactical Hitchhiker who has been stranded on earth. At the last possible moment they hitch a ride on one of the alien spaceships and flew away leaving the rest of earth and its population to be vaporized. Now they are ready to face the real problems.

Despite the humor and the amazing situations, the reader can still take this novel seriously because of its genius plot and it suspense. I see the humor as an extra topping on the cake.

This is a great book and I would recommend it to anyone 13 and above.  I give it a 5/5.