Review of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: The Complete Radio Series by Douglas Adams

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: The Complete Radio Series by Douglas Adams is a radio play series that follows the adventures of Arthur Dent, who manages to escape the Earth after it is destroyed, with his friend Ford Prefect. There's not much of a central plot to this series, but a lot of subplots as Arthur and the people he meets experience one improbable event after another. This series is hilarious, zany, and nonsensical, and I never get tired of listening to it, so I highly recommend it. I would say that I enjoyed the radio plays even more than the books. While the books are very funny, there is just some humor that is better expressed through an actor's voice and with music and/or sound effects. I would strongly suggest that any fans of the books should give the radio plays a chance. I would even recommend listening to them multiple times, because even though this is at least my third or fourth time around, I'm still picking up on things that I don't remember hearing before.

Review of Whom God Would Destroy by Commander Pants

Whom God Would Destroy by Commander Pants is a satirical novel that makes fun of both religion and the mental health industry. In this story a mental health caseworker named Oliver meets Jeremy, the owner of a new age shop, through one of his clients. Oliver quickly becomes enamored with the extremely charismatic shop owner, and begins to rethink his life while Jeremy does everything in his power to recruit Oliver as his first follower. In addition to Jeremy trying to bring about a new religious movement, this novel also follows the stories of multiple mental health patients who aren't quite as ill as they appear. I thought this book was hilarious and I highly recommend it. Please don't read it though if you think you will be easily offended by the subject matter, which includes explicit sex as well as the religious and mental health satire.

Review of Second Universe by John A. Ayala

I'm not sure why I even bothered to read Second Universe, the sequel to Primordial Labyrinth by John A. Ayala when I really didn't like the first one at all. I suppose I was hoping the sequel would help me understand the first short story better, but it really did not have that effect. This story was slightly easier to follow than the first one, but not enough to earn it more than one star. The most I could gather from the plot was that the protagonist and a couple of companions fled from war to a different universe where they then multiplied and then eventually started war in the second universe and dragged a few other universes into the war as well. Like Primordial Labyrinth, I feel like this short story was more like an outline for a story rather than a story in and of itself and that the author just tried to pack way too much stuff into too short of a story. I definitely don't recommend reading this story, and I doubt I will be reading anything else from this author.

Review of Primordial Labyrinth by John A. Ayala

I don't really have too much to say about the short story Primordial Labyrinth by John A. Ayala. I'm not even entirely sure what this story was about because it was so confusing and hard to follow. The best I could make out was that it involved some sort of space war to try to defeat some sort of labyrinth that may have been putting the entire universe in danger, but I'm not even entirely sure what exactly the labyrinth was. This short story seemed more like an outline for a story rather than a story itself. Maybe it could have been good if it was turned into a full length novel but it's pretty awful as it currently stands. I think the author tried to pack way too much into too short of a story without really bothering to explain a lot of things. I definitely would not recommend reading this story.

Review of The Dark Side of the Sun by Terry Pratchett

The Dark Side of the Sun by Terry Pratchett is the story of a young man named Dom who has been appointed to a powerful position on his planet, but unfortunately there have been multiple attempts on his life. It has been foretold that it is his fate to discover the world of the race of beings that seeded life in the universe and there are those that would prefer that this information not get out. This book follows Dom's adventures as he sets out on his quest to find answers and fulfill his destiny.

I have to say that I honestly didn't enjoy this book very much. It was completely different in style to everything else I've ever read by Terry Pratchett and if it weren't for the use of some terminology that was also used in his Discworld series, I wouldn't have even known I was reading one of his books. The humor that I've come to know and love in his writing just wasn't present in this book. There were some things that seemed like they were meant to be funny, but really just weren't. I did try to be open-minded about reading something more serious by Pratchett, but the lack of humor in the book wasn't the only thing wrong with it. I just found the book very hard to follow and I found myself feeling lost and confused at least a third of the time when reading it if not more. I think it would have helped if the author had spent more time explaining the various alien races in more detail as well as the technology used. I also felt the ending to the book was weird and really not that satisfying. It's a shame because the premise of this story was interesting and I did like how ancient alien theory was worked into the story, but it could have been done so much better than it was. At least it was a fairly short read so I didn't waste too much of my time on it. I really wouldn't recommend this book unless you're a hardcore Pratchett fan who absolutely has to read everything he's ever written.

Review of A Wrinkle in Time: The Graphic Novel by Madeleine L'Engle

A Wrinkle in Time: The Graphic Novel by Madeleine L'Engle is a comic book adaptation of the original book. In this story two children, Meg and Charles Wallace, along with their friend Calvin, meet three extraordinary extra-terrestrials who take them on a journey to save their father who is being held prisoner on another planet. The children must learn to use both their strengths and their faults and think outside the box in order to succeed in their mission. I would consider this story to be a combination of science fiction and fantasy. Although the methods of space travel are based in scientific theory, there really isn't any explanation for how it is supposed to work or any technological devices used, so the effect is pretty much the equivalent of magical teleportation. The graphic novel version of this book was fun quick read. The drawings were nice, but they were rather monochrome and I would have preferred more color. I found that the illustrated version helped me visualize some things better than I could with the original book. I also liked that there was less emphasis on religious themes than there was in the original book. I'd definitely recommend this book to anyone who's a fan of the original, but I'm not sure there's enough explanation of certain aspects of the story to really understand everything if you haven't read the original beforehand. A Wrinkle in Time: The Graphic Novel by Madeleine L'Engle is a comic book adaptation of the original book. In this story two children, Meg and Charles Wallace, along with their friend Calvin, meet three extraordinary extra-terrestrials who take them on a journey to save their father who is being held prisoner on another planet. The children must learn to use both their strengths and their faults and think outside the box in order to succeed in their mission.

I would consider this story to be a combination of science fiction and fantasy. Although the methods of space travel are based in scientific theory, there really isn't any explanation for how it is supposed to work or any technological devices used, so the effect is pretty much the equivalent of magical teleportation. The graphic novel version of this book was fun quick read. The drawings were nice, but they were rather monochrome and I would have preferred more color. I found that the illustrated version helped me visualize some things better than I could with the original book. I also liked that there was less emphasis on religious themes than there was in the original book. I'd definitely recommend this book to anyone who's a fan of the original, but I'm not sure there's enough explanation of certain aspects of the story to really understand everything if you haven't read the original beforehand.

Review of A Wind in the Door by Madeleine L'Engle

A Wind in the Door by Madeleine L'Engle is the sequel to A Wrinkle in Time. In this story there is an evil that is wreaking havoc on both a cosmic and a microscopic level. On the cosmic level stars seem to be disappearing and on the microscopic level people are getting sick with a strange disease affecting the mitochondria in their cells which causes fatigue and respiratory distress. Charles Wallace has come down come down with this condition. His sister Meg and her friend Calvin are called upon by some strange extra-terrestrials to help both save his life and to help fight the evil running rampant throughout the universe.

Like A Wrinkle in Time, this story has both elements of science fiction and fantasy. It also has some strong spiritual themes, but I feel that they are less religion specific than they were in the last book, so it bugs me less. This book is one of my childhood favorites, and as anyone who has read the book can see, it is very special to me considering that I took my screen name from one of the concepts described in the book. It was very strange reading the book again after all these years because my screen name feels very much a part of me and it was so odd seeing it constantly in a book despite the fact that this book is where it came from. Other than that, I really did enjoy reading it again very much and I would highly recommend it to others of all ages.

Review of A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle

A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle is one of my favorite books from childhood. In this story two children, Meg and Charles Wallace, along with their friend Calvin, meet three extraordinary extra-terrestrials who take them on a journey to save their father who is being held prisoner on another planet. The children must learn to use both their strengths and their faults and think outside the box in order to succeed in their mission.

I would consider this story to be a combination of science fiction and fantasy. Although the methods of space travel are based in scientific theory, there really isn't any explanation for how it is supposed to work or any technological devices used, so the effect is pretty much the equivalent of magical teleportation. I enjoyed reading this book nearly as much as an adult as I did when I was a child. In some ways I got even more out of it as an adult since I understand many of the scientific concepts talked about in the book much better now.

The only thing that bugs me about this book at this point in my life is the overt Judeo-Christian themes present in some places in the story. It would have been nice if the author could have stuck with the basic good vs. evil theme without bringing religion into it. I don't necessarily mind spiritual themes in the books I read, but it just felt like a bit much when it was implied that the characters were chosen for a mission by God, especially in what is supposed to be a science fiction story. Though if I recall correctly, the author also uses religious themes in other books in the series as well. In any case I felt that as much as it bugged me, that I could overlook these details in a book that is a childhood favorite, and it didn't spoil my enjoyment of the book too much. I would strongly recommend this book to both children and adults as it contains some very powerful messages in addition to being a great science fiction adventure story.

Review of Strata by Terry Pratchett

Strata by Terry Pratchett was a quick but entertaining read. It's about a company that manufactures planets much like Magrathea from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. The main character is contacted by a stranger who claims to have found a flat planet seeks to hire her to investigate this flat "discworld". She joins up with this stranger and other crew members on an expedition to explore this planet to try to determine how it was built and by whom.

It's been many years since I read this book so most of it was like reading it for the first time. There were some bits I remembered though and laughed at them just as much as I did the first time. I especially liked the ending. I don't recall if I was as surprised by the ending the first time I read the book since it was so long ago, but it really wasn't what I was expecting and I thought it was very clever.

On the whole I enjoyed it very much and would recommend it to fans of Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. The disc planet in this book is not the same one that is featured in the Discworld series, but it gives you a glimpse into how Pratchett first came up with the concept of Discworld, so I like to consider it a sort of unofficial prequel to the series.

The only thing that bothered me about the book was that there were some parts where it felt like events weren't quite in order, especially towards the end. Eventually I figured out that this was due to flashbacks and it wasn't immediately clear that's what was happening as I was reading it. It's possible this is just due to the way my ebook is formatted, but I don't feel like digging out my paper copy to thumb through it and check.

Review of Year Zero by Rob Reid

Year Zero is a very funny book and I absolutely loved it. This book makes fun of the music industry and copyright laws. The basic premise is that the rest of the universe is obsessed with Earth music, but before they became familiar with Earth laws they had already pirated so much Earth music that the universe owed all of its collective wealth to Earth in fines.

I gave this book five stars and would recommend it to anyone who likes humor/satire mixed in with their fantasy and sci-fi. Fans of Terry Pratchett's Discworld series will really be able to appreciate the author's use of humorous footnotes throughout the story.

Review of Douglas Adams's Starship Titanic by Terry Jones

Starship Titanic is a sort of spin off of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series. It was a collaboration done between Douglas Adams and Terry Jones of Monty Python. Douglas Adams did the computer game and Terry Jones wrote the novel. It's not the first time I've read this book, but I found it just as enjoyable this time around as from previous reads. I think it keeps very much in line with the style of the Hitchhiker's Guide books and I'd definitely recommend it to anyone who is a fan of the series.

Review of And Another Thing... by Eoin Colfer

For those that don't know, And Another Thing... is the 6th book in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series that was written after the death of Douglas Adams.

At first I was a little put off reading it because it felt as if I was reading fan fiction(which I suppose it technically is) due to the style not quite meshing with that of the original books. It also felt like it was written for a younger audience which I guess is somewhat understandable given that the author has mostly written books for young adults. There were a few other minor things that annoyed me such as the use of abbreviations and nicknames that were never used in the original books. An example of this is that pan galactic gargle blasters were often shortened to just gargle blasters.

However, the book seemed to get much better after the third chapter as far as style and reading level goes and the annoying abbreviations/nicknames were also much reduced in frequency. So I'd say that overall I rather enjoyed the book and gave it a 4 star rating, though I was quite disappointed that Marvin did not make an appearance in this story.

I would definitely recommend this book to those that are fans of the original five books especially since this one has a much less bleak ending than Mostly Harmless. As a side note, I am glad I decided to read The Salmon of Doubt before I read this book as it helped me to get a joke made regarding something that happened in the childhood of Douglas Adams. It's a rather minor thing though and it is by no means necessary to read The Salmon of Doubt before And Another Thing...