By Eoin Colfer
When approaching And Another Thing… you can’t help but think about the elephant in the room. In fact it’s a little more than an elephant in the room: it’s an entire zoo complete with gift shop, café and adequate toilet facilities. The esteem that not only Colfer obviously has for Douglas Adams and his fans is obvious on every page. So, in this sixth book in the now stupidly named trilogy that makes up The Hitchiker’s Guide To The Galaxy, Colfer – with the unenviable task of being the first ‘other’ to take on the HGTTG franchise since Adams’ untimely death – is careful not to parody the author. But he’s also determined not to stray too far from the style that made the books son successful. What results is a novel that – whilst having plenty of funny moments – ends up too deferent to explore the universe with the sideways look that Adams so loved.
Arthur Dent is thrown back into a galaxy in which the Earth has been destroyed – and this time for good. Honest. – the Vogons are on the prowl, and Zaphod Beeblebrox and Ford Prefect are thinking of new ways to ignore danger by drinking whatever is in front of them. In other words, it’s pretty much what he’s become used to over the past 100 years or so. But now he has a sulky teenage daughter, a lost love and a doomed colony of Earth people to save. And – even though he really wants to – he knows he really shouldn’t ask for a cup of tea.
Colfer deals with the continuity of HGTTG quite well (though, it is pretty easy when you can just about make everything up as you go along) and he’s captured some of the fun flights of fancy that the books sometimes indulged in (I particularly liked the account of the planet that uses parents as currency, hence the phrase “He’d sell his own grandmother,” was something of a complement). He also gets the nuances of most of the characters, and gives Trillian much more of a voice and personality than Adams ever did (Adams cheerfully admitted that his portrayal of Trillian was woefully underwritten). But Arthur – even with his ineffectual – is annoyingly sidelined and it plays as series of funny episodes with narrative flow feeling disjointed and forced. Also forced is the invention of new swearwords which – whilst funny when Adams first did it – has been done to death and really starts to annoy the Belgium out of me.
It’s easy to forget that, as talented as Adams was, his later forays into the HGTTG were done somewhat under duress and seemed to lack the spark of his earlier books. Whilst And Another Thing… certainly rattles along and will keep you entertained with a good laugh here and there, it all seems rather strained. But it seems that HGTTG franchise has become so big that it’s hard for many to let it go. It’s a shame as Arthur and Co deserve a nice cup of tea, a nice fresh towel and as long a time to rest as the rest of the universe – whilst enjoying their company – doesn’t really need them anymore.
And Another Thing… is published by Penguin Books and is available from Play.com, Blackwells and all good book shops.
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