So Long, and Thanks for all the Fish

So Long, and Thanks for all the Fish
By: Douglas Adams
Copyright: 1985
Portland House

3 Bookmarks out of 5

Coming off the great story that was Life, the Universe, and Everything, I was certainly curious as to what Douglas Adams was going to make happen in the universe of the Guide. Earth is gone. It is pretty much impossible to know what the question is to the ultimate answer to life, the universe, and everything. The Krikketmen are not going to blow up the whole universe anytime soon. In fact, it seemed like (to me, at least) going into this novel that there was very little left for Douglas to write about as far as the Hitchhiker's universe was concerned. Well, it certainly felt like this particular novel was grasping at straws when it came to plot ideas.

The story begins out wonderfully. Arthur Dent is dropped off on a mysterious planet in the middle of a rain storm. Slowly, upon wandering to a road, he begins to realize that this particular planet looks like Earth. In fact, it really is Earth! It was at this particular moment during my reading that my inner science fiction nerd began to dork-out hardcore. This plot was getting good! See, Earth had been destroyed, right? That's how the entire series starts off. The reader is drawn in by this perplexing situation and is the main driving force of the plot for the first quarter of the book.

Then, the plot goes from sorta awesome to pretty crappy. Now, I am not against love. Nor am I against love stories in any way, shape, or form. But, I also happen to be of the mindset that it is impossible for someone to fall in love at first sight. This, unfortunately, happens to Arthur Dent while he is hitchhiking back to his old house. There is a girl in the front passenger seat whose name is Fenchurch and she apparently seems to be off her rocker. She raves about yellow ships in the sky. So, while the reader has to muddle through with Arthur's infatuation, the reader also does begin to realize that the Earth really was blown up. So, while the reader just really wants to figure out how Arthur can be on Earth when it was blown up some odd years ago, Douglas Adams forces the reader to delve into a superficial love story between Arthur and Fenchurch. Not only does Arthur obsess over Fenchurch, Arthur also sits on the roof of his house and seems to feel the Earth as a living being and is somehow able to sense what he believes is Fenchurch in the hospital. Give me a break here, Adams. The Arthur Dent I know does not commune with the Earth. In fact, he spent 5 years on prehistorical Earth and never managed to build anything for himself and lived in a cave. When did this revelation come to Arthur? What happened on his travels to make him able to sense a person's mind in the hustle of the Earth?

Furthermore, the book actually starts out the exact way that The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy happened to begin. So Long, and Thanks for all the Fish is a story that is supposed to be about Fenchurch. Instead, we still manage to get a story that is mostly centered around Arthur. The only in-depth look into Fenchurch's life is the fact that she floats. But even that is left hanging (full pun intended) in the air for the reader to guess at. Is it because she had an epiphany that she forgot about and is constantly trying to remember, therefore leading her to not remember to hit the ground? The bottom line that I am trying to make is that the romance seems too forced. I would have believed an Arthur/Trillian hook-up because at least Adams made some references to it throughout the series. Ford evens asks Arthur in this book about what happened to Trillian.

Really, So Long, and Thanks for all the Fish leaves the reader with more questions than answers. I actually missed the reasoning for why Earth was where it should be even though it exploded. It wasn't until I read a brief synopsis online that I was told what it was and I had to go back and re-read that part in the book to actually understand it. Why are John Watson, Arthur, and Fenchurch the only ones on Earth to receive the message from the dolphins? But, there are some redeeming qualities. Arthur and Fenchurch meet up with Marvin, who dazzles us yet again with how depressed he his. Really, Marvin is my favorite character in the entire series and the one character I feel like has some depth to him (in a really twisted way). Arthur and Fenchurch also managed to find God's last message to his creation, which will hopefully make the reader laugh out loud. And to end on a positive note, in my volume of The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide, Douglas Adams adds a 10-page short story entitled Young Zaphod Plays it Safe which put a much better taste in my mouth because you get to see a snapshot of Zaphod before he alters his own brain. I can't wait to end my journey through the universe with Mostly Harmless.