The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams

or H2G2, as I and a few of my friends like to call it.

What do you say about a book which tells you that to learn how to fly, all you need to do is throw yourself at the ground and miss? Or introduces you to a planet where the leading life form is ball-point pens?

The first I heard of H2G2 was - "What do you mean, you have not read HitchHiker's Guide to the Galaxy? Have you lived or what?" After having read the book enough number of times to call myself a fan, that about sums up my recommendation of the book as well.

To make readers laugh, or smile is a big achievement for any author. Take P.G. Wodehouse, add tons of irreverence, some sci-fi jargon and you will have Douglas Adams writing H2G2. It is so ironic that you will find H2G2 listed under the heading "science fiction" while there is no other book I have read that takes the mickey out out of science fiction as much as this one.

H2G2 is a cult. It is a book that you will either fall in love with or throw away as being nonsense. "Did you like H2G2 or not?" is not a valid question, the question is, "Are you a H2G2 follower or not?" There are websites dedicated to discussions of what people like best about H2G2, several hours of discussion among friends have been spent agreeing with each other over the beauty of one statement after other from the book.

The thing that I liked about the book, apart from its irreverent humour, is its often philosophical undertone stated in a manner that strikes a chord somewhere without being jarring in the least. Like there is a statement "Two thousand years after a decent man was nailed to a tree for saying that it would be good to be nice to each other for a change; one girl sitting in a cafe suddenly realised that she had solved the mystery of the ultimate question of life, universe and everything. But before she could tell anyone, the planet earth was destroyed to make way for an intergalactic hyperspace pathway" (Not exact words from the book, rather from my memory)

Recommendation - Must read. I use the book as a sure cure after a depressing day at work. Just open at any page at random and read a couple of pages, and I am ready to face the world again.
Rating - ✔✔✔✔✔