Recently I read and finished Douglas Adams' The Salmon of Doubt. By recently I should say that I began the book when we reached Manchester on Saturday to see Radiohead, and I finished it on the journey back from Manchester on that Monday.
The Salmon of Doubt is is comprised of a collection of previously unpublished material by Douglas Adams that was collected and published after his death in 2001. It is divided into 3 parts: Life, the Universe, and Everything.
The first section, Life, focuses on Adams' own life through his boyhood and into his 'adulthood', including anecdotes about his large nose, his love for the Beatles, the lyrics to "Do-Re-Mi", and the English love of tea.
Next comes the Universe, which primarily focuses on Adams' love of technology and Mac computers, and his radical atheism. He talks about little dongly things (external power adapters), the idea of God and the four ages of sand, among other things.
One of my favourite anecdotes is called "Cookies".
Finally, the last section is Everything, and is really his unfinished last book about Dirk Gently. In a fax to his London editor about this book Adams said that
"Dirk Gently, hired by someone he never meets, to do a job that is never specified, starts following people at random. His investigations lead him to Los Angeles, through the nasal membranes of a rhinoceros, to a distant future dominated by estate agents and heavily armed kangaroos. Jokes, lightly poached fish, and the emergent properties of complex systems form the background to Dirk Gently's most baffling and incomprehensible case."
Unfortunately for us, we will never know what does happen to Dirk, but this book does offer the avid Adams fan one last chance to delve into his witty mind and catch a glimpse of his creative (and un-creative) processes.
Not good for a first-time Douglas Adams reader, but for someone who has read everything or almost everything, a must-read.
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