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Earth
It was an ordinary day in England when Arthur Dent woke up to discover his house was about to be demolished to make way for a bypass. As it so happened, the Earth was about to suffer the same fate. Arthur Dent was lucky enough to have a friend, Ford Prefect, who was actually an alien. Ford had been stuck on earth and knew how to escape the peril at hand. Thus ensues their adventure through time and space. -
Rescued?
Arthur and Ford hitchhike and get picked up by the Vogons who were destroying the earth. When they're discovered on board, the Vogon leader subjects them to some of his horrendous poetry and then decides he doesn't care for them at all so he kicks them off the ship into open space, where they cannot survive. -
Actually Rescued
Seconds before death in space, Ford and Arthur are improbably saved by a spaceship, specifically, the Heart of Gold. The ship has a new feature, called the Improbability Drive, which works to figure out how unlikely every situation is, and most of the time the ship ends up in very weird situations when the button for the Drive is pressed. That is how the hitchhikers came to be saved. -
Have We Met?
On board the ship, Ford and Arthur meet the people on it, whom they happen to know. They are Zaphod Breeblebrox, the President of the Galaxy, and Trillian, whom Arthur knew as Tricia McMillan on Earth. He had met her at a party, where they were getting along quite well, when Zaphod came along and sweeped her off her feet with talk of spaceships. Also, Ford and Zaphod were old friends from Betelguese. -
Where Are We?
Their ship arrives near its destination, Magrathea. The planet is somewhat a legend and thought lost forever. The inhabitants of it made their money by designing and building custom planets. Now though, they are asleep in the heart of the planet waiting for the economy to rebound. When they get near the planet, their old defense system sends missiles at them, but by using the Improbablity Drive, the missiles turn into a whale and a bowl of petunias. So they're free to land. -
Zaphod Explains
Zaphod explains why they were going to Magrathea, besides for the glory, fame, and money. There was once a gigantic super computer designed to figure out the Ultimate Answer of Life, the Universe, and Everything. Turns out it's 42, which upset them. So Deep Thought, the computer, designed another computer to figure out the Ultimate Question. That computer was called Earth, and was built by Magratheans. It was like one day before the answer would be ready, when the Earth was destroyed. -
Inside Magrathea
When they arrive on the planet, they find a tunnel leading underground, away from the abandoned surface. Arthur and Marvin the robot stay at the mouth of the tunnel to keep watch, but Arthur gets bored and goes exploring. He bumps into a man called Slartibartfast who takes him on his hovercraft into the heart of Magrathea to show him how they're building a 2nd Earth for the beings that want the Ultimate Question. -
Flight
They successfully flee from the scene and from the cops that show up looking to capture Zaphod for stealing the ship. After escaping, their new destination is the Restaurant at the End of the Universe since they're a bit peckish. -
Uh Oh.
Arthur meets the mice, and reunites with his friends. Events take a turn for the worse when the mice try to cut open Arthur's head to find the Ultimate Question, since he's the last living part of the organic computer of Earth. -
My thoughts
I liked the movie and had this book already so i decided to finally read it. I'm glad that I did. It's very funny and entertaining, making light of science fiction themes. This is a great book for anyone to read.
