Rating: 
Summary: READ THIS BOOK!!!
Review: Without the slightest hint of doubt, this is the best piece of non-graphic literature that I have ever read. I believe that this book should be taught in every high-scool English literature class, because the ideas and theories presented in this novel will boggle its readers' minds. It has a wonerful blend of hilarious comedy, but at the same time it is very poignant and thought-provoking. I recommend this book to everyone who can read.
Rating: 
Summary: Lighthearted, yet insightful, entertainment
Review: Forget Eric Idle's Monty Python past, and quit the comparisons to Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. This book is readable and enjoyable enough on its own, and the imaginative theories and revealing insights about humor and comedy in this book are priceless. One of the lessons from The Road to Mars is that there are all kinds of humor (which the character of Carlton tries desperately to analyze and organize), and this book does have its own humor--just don't expect it to be like Monty Python or HGTTG or even Eric Idle other efforts. It's an entertaining work of Fiction, period. It has some weak points, and of course it's not pure or even successful science fiction... but it is a funny romp. I think this book wouldn't be judged so harshly if the author was an unknown--though perhaps the book wouldn't have sold as well then!
Rating: 
Summary: Douglas Adams is still safe
Review: I also had high hopes for this book. Idle obviously has a sense of humor that comes along once in a lifetime. However, his talent for sketches and feature movies with his Python-mates didn't save this book. I really wanted to like this book, but it was a struggle to get through the damn thing. It reminded me of After The Blue, by Russel Like, which also promised to be the next "Hitch Hikers Guide." It didn't deliver, and neither does "Road to Mars" (it didn't even come as close as Starship Titanic, by another ex-Python, Terry Jones).There was talent there, and some sense of the wit that if wrapped around a more promising story line and with less adolescent sexual fantasy, would have made for a great book. Unfortunately, the story was lame, the distractions too frequent and the inspiration too sporadic. A disappointment. If Adams decides to start writing in this genre again, he'll still be without effective competition, even after taking over 10 years off.
Rating:
Summary: I got through it....
Review: I'm a die-hard Python fan, but I found myself struggling to finish this novel, which is sad since it's only 309 pages. It has its good points (see below), but overall there were several things that kept me from enjoying this novel more. Maybe I was expecting too much (go figure), but to me the characters didn't seem underdeveloped as much as they just seemed simply shallow. After about a third of the book, it became very easy to predict how the characters would act in the rest of the book, which was somewhat disappointing. HOWEVER- The plot was fun and intriguing. In my opinion, there was enough plot here to double the size of the book just filling out the story. Carlton's observations on the nature of comedy were quite intelligent as well- you can tell that Mr. Idle had been thinking about this, probably long before he started on "Mars". Also, Mr. Idle had a great character in Brenda Woolley, and did a great job in bringing her to life. She's my favorite character simply by the way she made me sick to my stomach with her inane conceit. She seemed to be the only character who fit the "shallowness" of the characterizations, just because she was herself very shallow!
Rating:
Summary: The Hitchhikers Guide Part 6????
Review: Dear oh dear...many years ago Eric Idle used to write these short one-off parodies,for his television show "Rutland Weekend Television"....and "The Road To Mars" would've been a five minute sketch parodying "The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy". Unfortunately....he was given a much bigger budget this time. I am a big fan of Mr.Idle's works,and was disappointed by this book. To me,he has written the funniest Python solo book: "Hello Sailor",sadly out of print. So I was expecting something as equally original and hilarious,but this just reads like a poor man's Douglas Adams. Two Comedians of varying standards,Muscroft and Ashby ( or is that Dent & Prefect?) set off across the galaxy on a stand-up comedy tour.Going with them is Carlton the Android ( or is that Marvin the android? ),whom is trying to logically calculate why comedy is comical. Along the way they meet a very lovely and intelligent woman of intrigue,Katy Wallace ( or Tricia McMillian )and an over the top comedian,whom nobody seems to like but himself,Booper.( or Zaphod Beeblebrox ).There is also a series of robots with "human" personality problems,and all sorts of overly gracious robot doors. How could Mr.Idle,not think people would spot the comparrissons? Another annoyance to this book,is Carlton's constant attempt to analyze comedy,and whilst doing such,making the very thought of comedy, unfunny.Perhaps the original idea of "The Road To Mars" as a parody of Crosby and Hope films,would've worked better. I would sugest this book to Python completists,but if you want Eric Idle's best writings,find "Hello Sailor" or "The Rutland Dirty Weekend Book".Make It So!
Rating: 
Summary: Tries to be too many things, succeeds in only a few
Review: I wasn't quite sure what to think about "The Road to Mars." The biggest problem with it, I think, is that it tries to be too many things at once. Science Fiction, Comedy, Social Satire, Commentary on the Nature of Comedy, Political Thriller and "Road to (fill in the blank)" Movie. Each element separately almost succeeded, but all thrown together it became a hopeless mish-mash. That isn't to say that a book that contains these elements CAN'T work, just in this case, for me, it didn't. Another problem was that I didn't find Muscroft and Ashby to be funny at all. It's possible that their act would have been funny if one saw it, but in print it just seems crude and flat and their humor seemed almost anachronistic in comparison to their modern setting. That leads right into the fact that really, I don't think I liked any character in the whole book other than Carlton and Boo. Most problematic for me was the Katie Wallace character. What did she want? Why did she do the things she did, and why did she choose the people she did to do them with? We never find out other than a very basic explanation that hardly explains anything. She is a device to move the plot along and an excuse for a drawn-out sex scene and little else. Some parts did work, though. I thought the insights into the nature of comedy were especially good, even though as others have pointed out not every one is completely accurate. The entire character of Carlton was a good invention, and I liked the format the book was told in - from the notes of an envious and scheming Micropaleontologist. There were moments of real suspense and humor scattered throughout the book. And best of all, it was fun to play the "Casting Game" with it - John Cleese would play Lewis Ashby, David Bowie would play Carlton (of course!) and who would be Boo? Robin Williams or Bobcat Goldthwait? It was also interesting to speculate who certain characters might be based on in real life... So on the whole I'm afraid the book didn't quite work for me, but your mileage may vary. It wasn't a complete loss, though - pick it up if you're not sure and give it a try for yourself!
Rating:
Summary: In Space Can Anyone Hear You Giggle?
Review: If John Cleese and Graham Chapman were the brains of the creature known as Monty Python's Flying Circus, Michael Palin was definitely the heart, Terry Jones the soul and Terry Gilliam the eyes. Eric Idle was without a doubt the voice. His sketches were mostly word play and musical in nature. It is his exquisite use of wordplay that shines through in the novel "Road to Mars". Eric certainly had a lot of fun writing this story, and it shows. Any Python fan worth their weight in spam can hear Mr. Idle reciting the novel in their mind as they read. It would be unfair to compare this to anything Python did as a whole. Eric was only 1/6th of the troupe. So, he brings to his novel what he did with the show... entertaining characters with sharp dialogue and wacky asides. The narrator's voice is pure Eric Idle. His wicked asides throughout the novel are well timed and spaced. Carlton, the David Bowie resembling android and his "Theory of Levity" make for some great chuckles. Muscroft and Ashby are the classic comedy duo. And then, of course, there's the entertainer/mega-diva Brenda, who as Mr. Idle states, tortures the masses by "singing at them". I really liked this novel. The continuing exploration of comedy and its origins I thought were very well thought out. Others may find this not so entertaining. In any event, this was a fun novel. You certainly don't have to be a fan of Monty Python's Flying Circus to enjoy it.
Rating:
Summary: Light reading
Review: A quick review - Don't expect too much from this book. It doesn't have anything in the way of depth, but it is entertaining light reading. Bits are dull, bits are great. Good over all, but there are so many better books out there.
Rating:
Summary: Tired and Flat
Review: Here we have Eric Idle's second adult novel, _The Road to Mars_. Idle, of course, is a member of the great British comedy group Monty Python's Flying Circus, and a reasonably successful comedian, actor and author on his own since the Python days. In this novel Idle seems mainly interested in discussing the nature of comedy. This is a pretty decent theme for a novel, if perhaps hard to get at. Idle chooses to have his story narrated by a 25th Century academic named Bill Reynolds. Reynolds has found a thesis submitted by a robot, called _De Rerum Comoedia_, which he apparently finds brilliant. The robot, named Carlton, was working for a two man comedy team, Muscroft and Ashby (very much in the mode of Laurel and Hardy etc.), and trying to understand comedy, something no notoriously literal-minded AI had ever been able to do. This book is Reynolds' narration of a trip Carlton took with Muscroft and Ashby, from Saturn on "the Road to Mars", a tour through the Asteroid Belt to Mars, interspersed with both Reynolds and Carlton theorizing about comedy, and Reynolds trying to publish Carlton's thesis and worrying about his unfaithful girlfriend. All this is promising material. The conceit of having a robot try to understand comedy is a sound way of using an SFnal premise to attack a mainstream theme. And I have no quarrel with Idle's decision to tack on a fairly routine thriller plot, involving terrorists upset about plans to send ice from the Asteroid Belt to help further terraform Mars. However, promising as this all may be, it doesn't really work. The novel fails on several grounds. The least important is as SF: Idle has committed a number of scientific howlers. None is terribly important, though, so I think they could all have been forgiven. Another forgivable failure is the concentration on 20th Century comics (inevitably including Idle himself) in Carlton and Reynolds' discussions of comedy. More important is the rudimentary and not very involving thriller plot. None of it really makes a whole lot of sense, it's never very exciting, and the resolution is very flat. (The main characters, Muscroft and Ashby and Carlton, are a bit better: we do care about them.) The most important failures, though, are these: 1) the book tries to be funny, and it really isn't very funny. Oh, there are bits and pieces that made me laugh, but there's a whole lot of boring schtick. And 2), the attempts at explaining comedy, or making us believe that Carlton understands it (and could get a Nobel Prize for his thesis!) are roundly unconvincing. In sum, I found _The Road to Mars_ tired and flat, not successful either as SF, as comedy, or simply as a novel.
Rating:
Summary: Something different
Review: I enjoyed this book a great deal. Although I can't say that I entirely agree with the author's theories on comedy (assuming they are actually his in reality) I found the book to be a good read simply in itself. I must admit, however, that there were times that I found myself reading past some of the more involved explanations of how comedy and comedians work. If you're just after an adventure then this is not for you, but if you'd like some insights into how the mind of one of the world's better comedians works then read on.
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