I am planning to read "The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy" again. Thought I would dip my toes in and start at the beginning with this novella which is a prequel to the main tale. Hadn't read this one so -- yay! Not to give too much away but this story gives another reason for the destruction of Earth. Zany, entertaining, and loads of fun. I miss this universe (and Zaphod) so much!!

This is a short story, apparently written for The Utterly Utterly Merry Comic Relief Christmas Book, 1986, but now available somewhere towards the back of The Salmon Of Doubt, which is a collection of various amusing things Douglas Adams wrote that was published posthumously.

Despite saying that I wasn't going to read any more Douglas Adams, because despite his engaging style (when not technobabbling) and wit (when not too bleakly satirical) I never enjoy his books as much at the end as I do at the start, I did just want to read this story. After reading all of the Hitch Hiker books last year, I was excited to note that there was one other bit of the story out there, starring by far my favourite character Zaphod - or should we say the only character in all of the Adams-verse who I genuinely like.

So anyway, now I have read it. Goodreads is rather exaggerating and raising false hopes by calling this a 'novella'. It is only 14 pages long. Zaphod himself does not disappoint and is as likeable a character to be around as before. I missed him after Adams for some reason got bored and stopped writing about him in the final couple of books, even though he's the only character who ever had any plot going on. The story is suitably creepy and intriguing, in a kind of classic SF horror way. But at 14 pages long, most of that being used to set up atmosphere, and one amusing sequence in which Zaphod keeps throwing up in horror, we arrive very quickly at the end, and since we are only just about to discover the 'revelation' you realise that it must just be a gag (really this set up could have been the start of a novel... which I suppose if this is taken as a prequel to the first book, it is). So there you get it, all the build up is just for a silly political gag that is terribly dated here in the year 2020. Sigh. I guess this follows the same pattern of all Adams' stories - great set up, disappointing ending.

Oh well, it was nice to see Zaphod again.

Bummer that this story was censored to the point it no longer made sense. The whole punchline was missing, though on learning what the punchline was, I could appreciate it more.

Easily the weakest Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy related reading of the entire omnibus. I gained nothing from reading it. I hope the last book is more in line with the original books in the series.

A short story about Zaphod and Ronald Reagan even though he was removed in pretty much every edition. Using Zaphod to express a political opinion is ok, I guess.

I read this story as part of The Time Traveller's Almanac.

A typically wacky, entertaining story dealing with flying filing cabinets, lobsters (many...) and designer humans from Douglas Adams. As science fiction is wont to do, he takes various digs at "life as we know it", but all in good humour. A fun read.

Given that I was expecting a story dealing with time travel, I was very disappointed to discover that it is not. This has nothing to do with the story itself, but everything to do with it's selection for inclusion in The Time Traveller's Almanac.

I’m very perplexed after reading this. Once again, the ending is super abrupt. (Comments here say that the “Designer Person” was in fact Ronald Reagan, which was removed in the edition I read. Still doesn’t fix it, though I guess it seems slightly less random?)

The original ending to this (available in The Salmon of Doubt) makes this story make sense; the edited ending, frankly, blows chunks.