On Friday, May 11, 2001, the world mourned the untimely passing of Douglas Adams, beloved creator of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, dead of a heart attack at age forty-nine. Thankfully, in addition to a magnificent literary legacy—which includes seven novels and three co-authored works of nonfiction—Douglas left us something more. The book you are about to enjoy was rescued from his four computers, culled from an archive of chapters from his long-awaited novel-in-progress, as well as his short stories, speeches, articles, interviews, and letters.

In a way that none of his previous books could, The Salmon of Doubt provides the full, dazzling, laugh-out-loud experience of a journey through the galaxy as perceived by Douglas Adams. From a boy’s first love letter (to his favorite science fiction magazine) to the distinction of possessing a nose of heroic proportions; from climbing Kilimanjaro in a rhino costume to explaining why Americans can’t make a decent cup of tea; from lyrical tributes to the sublime pleasures found in music by Procol Harum, the Beatles, and Bach to the follies of his hopeless infatuation with technology; from fantastic, fictional forays into the private life of Genghis Khan to extended visits with Dirk Gently and Zaphod Beeblebrox: this is the vista from the elevated perch of one of the tallest, funniest, most brilliant, and most penetrating social critics and thinkers of our time.

Welcome to the wonderful mind of Douglas Adams.

From the Hardcover edition.

**

From Publishers Weekly

Edited by Peter Guzzardi and with an introduction by Christopher Cerf, this bittersweet collection comprises letters, fragments of ideas for books, films and TV, ruminations on a diverse array of subjects and a good bit of a final unfinished novel by the author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series, who died in May of last year. Included are a letter to the editor of a U.K. boy's magazine (written in 1965, when Adams was 12); a reminiscence about his lifelong love for the Beatles, written when he was in his 40s; a 1991 piece from Esquire entitled "My Nose"; and an undated article for the Independent espousing his preference for whiskey. Also on hand are a q&a in which he identifies the most interesting natural structure as being a "2,000-mile-long fish in orbit around Jupiter, according to a reliable report in the Weekly World News"; a spiritual encounter with a giant manta ray while testing a mechanical diving device at Australia's Great Barrier Reef; an affecting introduction to P.G. Wodehouse's unfinished novel, Sunset at Blandings; an account of a Save the Rhino pilgrimage across Africa; ruminations on computerization; and a philosophical address about the authorship of the universe entitled "Is There an Artificial God?" Two sketches "The Private Life of Genghis Khan" and "Young Zaphod Plays It Safe" from the Utterly Utterly Merry Comic Relief Christmas Book, 1986, are also here, as are 10 chapters from various versions of the title novel-in-progress. National advertising.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

When Adams died unexpectedly in May 2001, he had not written fiction in ten years. The success of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series and the peculiar adventures of Detective Dirk Gently had made Adams an sf icon. His fans kept hoping for at least one more weird and wonderful galactic adventure. The Salmon of Doubt is a loving tribute to the author by his friends, who decided that the best way to salute his life and work was to collect some of the more unusual bits of it and let the world share the mind of a wonderfully talented man, with a unique viewpoint on almost everything. The book comprises selections from a huge amount of material, a fascinating collection of bits and pieces of a busy writer's life. Articles on a variety of subjects written for various magazines and newspapers, introductions to books, speeches, personal interviews, and glimpses of a well-enjoyed life are included. Adams describes the traumas of his school days, his love for the Beatles and Bach, an illicit liaison with someone else's dogs, and his fascination with evolutionary theory. Among the fiction entries is a tale from the private life of Genghis Khan and a Zaphod Beeblebrox short story. The narrators were all personal friends of Adams's: actor Simon Jones reads the largest portion of the book and does a wonderful job; Stephen Fry also takes a turn, and Christopher Cerf reads a eulogistic introduction that he wrote for the print version. Fans will be both happy and sad to experience this final chapter of Adams's journey through the galaxy. Highly recommended, but libraries will want to repackage this audio for circulation.
Barbara Rhodes, Northeast Texas Lib. Syst., Garland
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.