The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
821 Rating(s)
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The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Author: Douglas Adams

Narrator: Stephen Fry

Unabridged: 5 hr 51 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 04/05/2005


Synopsis

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • “Extremely funny . . . inspired lunacy . . . [and] over much too soon.”—The Washington Post Book World

Nominated as one of America’s best-loved novels by PBS’s The Great American Read

This audiobook version of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is read by Stephen Fry and is available for download or streaming. Seconds before Earth is demolished to make way for a galactic freeway, Arthur Dent is plucked off the planet by his friend Ford Prefect, a researcher for the revised edition of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy who, for the last fifteen years, has been posing as an out-of-work actor.

Together, this dynamic pair began a journey through space aided by a galaxyful of fellow travelers: Zaphod Beeblebrox—the two-headed, three-armed ex-hippie and totally out-to-lunch president of the galaxy; Trillian (formerly Tricia McMillan), Zaphod’s girlfriend, whom Arthur tried to pick up at a cocktail party once upon a time zone; Marvin, a paranoid, brilliant, and chronically depressed robot; and Veet Voojagig, a former graduate student obsessed with the disappearance of all the ballpoint pens he’s bought over the years.

Where are these pens? Why are we born? Why do we die? For all the answers, stick your thumb to the stars!

Praise for The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

“A whimsical oddyssey . . . Characters frolic through the galaxy with infectious joy.”—Publishers Weekly

“Irresistable!”—The Boston Globe

About Douglas Adams

Douglas Adams, a legend of imaginative fiction, ushered in the advent of comedic science fiction with The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. The book developed into a hugely successful series of five novels. The Dirk Gently series—Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency and The Long Dark Tea-time of the Soul—helped cement Adams as one of the most successful and beloved authors in science fiction.


Reviews

AudiobooksNow review by JZapp on 2007-12-19 12:38:03

First of all, it's only 3 discs. Second, it's more like a radio program, with stops and starts than a book. Third, it's a lousy book. I am a big fan of the other three books so I was totally disappointed with this.

Goodreads review by Jon on June 29, 2007

In my experience, readers either love Adams' books or quickly put them down. I, for example, quite literally worship the words Adams puts on the page, and have read the Hitchhiker's Trilogy so many times that I have large tracts of it memorized. But both my wife and father couldn't get past book one......more

Goodreads review by J.G. Keely on January 02, 2014

The universe is a joke. Even before I was shown the meaning of life in a dream at 17 (then promptly forgot it because I thought I smelled pancakes), I knew this to be true--and yet, I have always felt a need to search for the truth, that nebulous, ill-treated creature. Adams has always been, to me,......more

Goodreads review by Emily May on July 28, 2018

I am not one of those who think this is the best book ever written. It does not affect me on any deep emotional level and this kind of quirky sci-fi comedy is just not really my thing. However, that being said, Adams' has some of the best quotes EVER (not all of these are from this exact book): "In t......more

Goodreads review by Tom on January 16, 2008

Another classic. If you don't like this series, you probably put your babel fish in the wrong hole. You are the reason that human beings are only the third most intelligent species on earth behind mice and dolphins. So long, and thanks for all the fish!......more

Goodreads review by Federico on February 15, 2024

Absurdity at its finest. Arthur Dent is having a bad day, his house is about to be levelled down because it’s in the way of the construction of a new freeway. At the local pub, he encounters his enigmatic friend Ford Prefect. Prefect, a galactic hitchhiker, is leaving the Earth, and taking Dent wi......more


Quotes

Don't panic! Here are words of praise for The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy!

"It's science fiction and it's extremely funny...inspired lunacy that leaves hardly a science fiction cliche alive."

Washington Post

"The feckless protagonist, Arthur Dent, is reminiscent of Vonnegut heroes, and his travels afford a wild satire of present institutions."

Chicago Tribune

"Very simply, the book is one of the funniest SF spoofs ever written, with hyperbolic ideas folding in on themselves."

School Library Journal

"As parody, it's marvelous: It contains just about every science fiction cliche you can think of. As humor, it's, well, hysterical."