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Mostly Harmless

Mostly Harmless

List Price: $7.50
Your Price: $6.75
Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 1 stars
Summary: It Sucks!
Review: The first three Hitchhiker books were funny and entertaining, but in the last 2 books Adams lost his touch, and now I wich I hadn't read them. If you're about to finish the series, I'll warn you you'll be VERY dissapointed.

Rating: 1 stars
Summary: Not even worth checking out of the library
Review: The first three Hitchhikers books are probably the most hilarious books I have ever read. The fourth, _So Long and Thanks for all the Fish_ was a great disappointment, and lacked the brilliant spark of the first three. _Mostly Harmless_ is mean spirited and largely devoid of humor. I think Adams not only has lost interest in these books, but has lost his muse. Sad to see him writing such junk as _Mostly_, I would presume just for the money. I felt cheated for buying this book, and I cannot even recommend checking it out of the library, as surely your time must be worth something

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Douglas Adams' Mostly Harmless is Wonderfully Weird!
Review: I think this book is a fitting end for the Hitchhikers trilogy. What else could have happened

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Humorist Douglas Adams does it again with Mostly Harmless!
Review: In his most recent addition to the Hitchhiker's series, Douglas Adams stays true to form with witty humor and thoughtful, though unlikely, ideas. Though like the other four Hitchhiker's novels it focuses on the amusingly dull life of Briton-turned-space-traveller Arthur Dent and his streetwise friend Ford Prefect, Mostly Harmless also includes Adams' ideas on such subjects as dimentional mechanics. Also surprising is the fact that, unlike many of his other books, Mostly Harmless seems to have a true ending, raising questions about future novels in the series. All in all, Mostly Harmless is an excellent showcase of Adams' writing talent. (NOTE: See also Terry Pratchett for fantasy novels written in a similar style.)

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Hillarious closure to the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy
Review: Well it was true that the first Three book in the trilogy could have just been one long one and Adams was cashing out, they were funny books. When adams came out with the fourth book, it rather sucked. No Trillian, or Zaphod. This book really ends the series, and brings back Trillian and a new surprize charater, the best sci fi or comedy book ever, done it great style. When the book ends, your shocked, but happy.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Mostly Harmless is totally hoopy
Review: A great book! Need I say more?

Well actually yes. Most people seemed not to like this book as much as the first three, so I suppose I should explain my opinion!

Granted, Mostly Harmless does have darker humor, and less light-heartedness than some of Adams' other books, but it is also wonderful for its seriousness. We learn that Ford is a fierce animal rights activist (except for when it comes to geese), that all Tricia wants is another chance, that Random just wants to belong somewhere. And the book does have its lighter moments- Colin, Ford's musings on his life as a hitchhiker, the depiction of Random as the Dr. Jeckle and Miss Hyde of teenagers. And there are the touching bits- Random letting her guard down towards her father (well, for a few minutes), Tricia pouring her heart out to Gail, and, of course, the heart-pounding, breath-taking romance of Random conking Ford on the noggin with a rock.

Granted, Mostly Harmless does have a few disappointments. I missed Zaphod and Marvin in this story, and the ending was completely unnecessary. Still, overall, it's a worthwhile read.

What about a sequel? Impossible, because of the circumstances of the ending? Well, not really. Adams has certainly played around with Time enough in the past. A time machine- or a sudden eddy in the space-time continuum- could either prevent the ending, or save those involved. After all, we need to know how Tricia would react to finally seeing Zaphod again, what Fenny would think of Arthur's daughter, how Ford and Random would see each other, if introduced on a friendlier basis. Hopefully, Adams will realize the potential left in the series, and continue his wonderful work!

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Fun Crazy House Ride
Review: * When I was going through my final fits of academic labor in the
summer of 1981, I was working on a summer-crash-course thermodynamics
class, work that kept me up late and reduced me to peculiar mental
states. As I closed my thermo text one night in such a state, I
turned on the radio only to hear ... THE HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE
GALAXY. It was appropriate to the moment and my outlook.

That wasn't the end of it, either. Now we have a fifth volume in "the
increasingly innaccurately named HitchHiker's Trilogy." In MOSTLY
HARMLESS, we see old friends: Ford Prefect, Trillian, Vogons, and of
course Arthur Dent -- and new faces: an insanely cheeful security
robot named Colin, galactic bar singers, Arthur's daughter Random (who
he had no idea existed), a group of aliens who observe Earth from a
distance but do not know why (having collectively and literally lost
their minds), an Earth where four-leaf-clovers are normal and
three-leaf-clovers are lucky, and, most important of all, a new and
much more sinister Guide.

MOSTLY HARMLESS continues the HITCHHIKER's tradition of imaginative
madness, but it differs from earlier parts of the series in two
respects. First, the story has a clever, coherent, and imaginative
underlying plot rationale, something that was largely absent in the
earlier elements of the series. In fact the whole thing resembles an
elaborate puzzle that you have to inspect carefully even when, in the
end, all the pieces have neatly clicked together.

Second, and much more important, in the end this is not a funny book
at all; there is the usual humor during the course of the trip, but
the destination is dark and despairing, and the usual sense of
insanity and fatalism that marks the earlier parts of the series seems
to be felt with conviction: events are incoherent; we understand
nothing; we are at the mercy of chance.

It is probably well, then, that MOSTLY HARMLESS is the end of
the series. Or is it? In a Universe of infinite improbabilities,
somewhere, someplace, infinite numbers of sequels are being
written. [Minor update of review from 1993.]

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Adams scores again!
Review: Adams aptly named "hitchhiker's trilogy" continues on in this all too short book. The author's focus is on three and a half characters, Arthur Dent, Ford Prefect, Tricia McMillan....and Arthur and Tricia's daughter Random.

We learn that Arthur is welcomed as a master sandwich maker on a planet similar in make up to Earth. He has also sold his DNA for quick cash to what appears to be the future of sperm banks!

Tricia is Trillian is Tricia.

Ford becomes completely disillusioned due to his employeer selling out to a large corporation. It would appear that even space and time are not safe from capitalism.

Random wants to fit in--and finds solace in Arthur's watch, before she broke it that is...er was.

Everthing, from an Adamsian perspective, is completely normal, as is exemplified by the appearance of the "perfectly normal beasts" that migrate through time and space allowing Arthur to make sandwiches of them after a successful hunt.

As the story shapes and is molded by the storyteller, the one character that is most missed is Zaphod Beeblebrox, the two-headed cosmic leader and pirate. Also, Martin, the manic depressant robot is sorely missed.

It is a shame that Adams is no longer of this Earth to share more about the trials and tribulations of our favorite characters! However, I will re-read this series occassionally as I do my other favorite reads.



Rating: 2 stars
Summary: The way not to end a terrific series..
Review: "Mostly Harmless" is the last of the "Hitchhiker" books, and I do wish that it wasn't. The ending did tie off a lot of loose ends, but it did the readers a terrible disservice. Frankly, I hope this was a dream concocted by the dolphins of "So Long...". Anyway, Arthur Dent, the Everyman, and Ford Perfect, the flaky Alien, are at it again. Not a lot of humour in this one. Trillian having a daughter by artifical insemination didn't work at all, and this really set up one of the wrost endings I've ever read. Thanks for nothing, Douglas Adams. You are missed, however.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: good
Review: *WARNING: CONTAINS SPOILERS!!*

I loved all of the books,thought the ending to mostly harmless certainly hurt (when I read books, I imagine them to be alive. In addition, I seem to have developed some sort of curse that makes certain that each and every favourite character I ever decide on will die by the end of the book/series/whatever. So Ford dying in the end certainly didn't help my opinion of this book).

A lot of people have brought up questions regarding continuity and loopholes with regards to the ending, and I think that this was intentional - My GUESS, is the Douglas Adams purposely ended the book the way he did to be finished and done with it, but to also give people who couldn't deal with the death a simple way out of having to.

I cannot deal with the death ( ;) ) so I am pretending in my mind that Ford and the others simply hitch-hiked their way out of the situation, and continued on their way, while sorting out Fenchurch, Zaphod, Trillian/Tricia, and Random along the way, and, everyone did indeed live happily ever after.

It could happen.


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