Customer Reviews

Douglas Adams's Starship Titanic

5 star:		(23)
4 star:		(24)
3 star:		(20)
2 star:		(16)
1 star:		(23)

 

 

Starship Titanic is an entertaining book, with a wit and humor on par with Douglas Adams' books. That's pretty much where the similarity ends, however - lovers of Adams will notice the lack of good tech jokes, and my favorite Adams technique, the "puzzle-piece-plot-device", which is when odd and insignificant events are later explained as being cataclysmic. There are also numerous sexually explicit situations in the book, which, while quite amusing, are definitely not Adams material.

Because Starship Titanic is not an Adams book, I believe it should not be judged as such. As a result, the four stars this book deserves are not due to difference in writing styles, but to general lack of anything interesting -- while very funny in places, the plot is predictable and linear. The book also introduces characters that, while frequently discussed, are never really elaborated upon (Nigel and Titania come to mind).

Read Starship Titanic if you like good Pythonesque humor, but don't expect to find anything in the caliber of the Hitchhiker's Guide.

I'm so bummed. I thought that this would be a really great book, well within the spirit and method of Douglas Adams. What a crushing disappointment. The dialog is wooden, the characters shallow, hopeless caricatures of themselves, there's no motivation for their actions, and the writing reads like a parody of Douglas Adams. I'm only halfway through, and I don't find the book engaging, interesting, or even vaguely engaging. I must admit that I've read nothing by Terry Jones in the past, but I am a huge fan of Douglas Adams, and have read all of his books several times. For those that might be interesting in purchasing this, I discourage you from doing so. It is, in my mind, the only flaw in the writings of Douglas Adams. Although he did not write it, he certainly had a hand in it. I'm left wondering: What was he thinking?

After hassling my bookstore for three days (a while ago), I got my hands on the book and read it in one go. Not because is was very good, but because I was waiting for the fun to start, which never really did. I finished the book, tossed it in a corner (far away from my other, loved, DNA stuff) where it'll probably stay for the rest of its sorry life. I felt somewhat had, because I had bought a book which sole purpose was to sell a lot of books (DNA fans will buy anything he puts his name on) and a lot of computergames. It has it's funny moments, but the way in which the very simple story is told is shallow and never makes one wish it was longer. One of the biggest mistakes is the title: It's just extremely tacky and lacks every kind of creativity. Anyone could come up with a title like that. Just not a good book.

Douglas (if you read this, as you should): Move somewhere really remote, bring your laptop with only a word processor installed and start working!

Douglas Adams and Terry Jones are among the most humourous authors out there. From the beginning to the end this book is both funny and it does keep you on the edge of your seat. Turning the page in this book is like turning a corner, you find something new each time.

Although some parts in the book are rated R, and even X, it is still a good book to read. The language in some parts is a bit more than one could hope for, but if you look over that it is a very funny, and exciting book.

Leoventus has made a huge technologicular advance, and has created the Starship Titanic. But, when he changed work crews to Blerontonians, the work became very shotty, and the day before launch the ship is not at ALL finished and his Titania is a mess! From there everything gets too crazy and it would be hard to explain. There is a talking Bomb, which is very nice, and some crazed rabbits (Terry Jones for ya), and small men, that strangely enough remind you of lawn gnomes.

This book is smartely written, and very creatievely written, so when you plunge into this book, be prepared for the unimaginable and unexplainable.

Mark_Sigel

The cover was attractive. The misleading monicer 'Douglas Adams' Starship Titanic' was promising. Having Python troupe member Terry Jones' name on the byline piqued my interest. But this book is terrible. The Hitchhiker's Guide was founded on startling imagination, and priceless turns of phrases. Never before had a read an author who so joyously experimented with language as Adams did in his Hitchhiker series -- and I fear I may never again. Jones' weak novel might well have been imagined in one 15 minute seating: there are no memorable characters, no ingenuous planets, no hillarious creatures, no sparkling exchanges of dialogue. What little chuckles reside in this book are temporary: readers won't be recalling them throughout their life as hysterical social commentary, much like I still do with the Hitchhiker series. I will tell you the funniest part: there is a self-destruct mechanism which is accidentally set in motion, and the computer begins to count down the seconds to detonation. With no other idea of how to stop their doom, one of the drab characters (I don't even care who, anymore) goes down and talks to the computer to make it lose count. This the computer does, until it realizes it's being duped, and then it begins to count resentfully again, and again he is distracted... Not worth it, folks. Watch Life of Brian, or read Mostly Harmless. Or flog yourself with belts -- just don't read Starship Titanic.

After reading all of Douglas Adams books, I found reading someone elses words (although Mr. Adams idea/outline) to be somewhat odd. It was like blowing my nose and wondering afterwards if that was really my snot in the rag. It felt good when I was done, but left me with a feeling that something was amiss. British dry humor has always appealed to me, so Starship Titanic will fill a nice niche in my "Books to Read While Traveling on Vacation" shelf. Don't expect too much from this book...just have a nice cup of tea and enjoy.

This book was written entirely to promote and support the computer game Starship Titanic. This is not a true Douglas Adams book, and he should be embarrassed to have lent his name to such a blatantly commercial product. This book is the equivilent of the pulp novels written after movies are completed in order to promote them. Play the game Starship Titanic on your computer, but don't waste your time on the book. If you want to read some good science fiction, try Philip K. Dick.

This is one of the worst books I've ever read. How Douglas Adams could allow this crap to be published under his name completely puzzles me. I'm really disappointed that Adams lets his fans pay good money for such lousy reading.The plot is non-existing, the characters are flat and uninteresting and the whole thing is meaningless. It's a pity, because I really looked forward to this book and have enjoyed Adams's other work immensely.

1) That you read this in one sitting is no recommendation. You also read the back of your cereal box in one sitting--in which case, at least, you have something to chew on.

2) So it's unfair to expect Douglas Adams? Then why does his name appear at the very top of the cover in very large letters (in letters significantly larger than those in which Terry Jones's name appears at the very bottom of the cover)? Given "Starship Titanic"'s marketing, it is perfectly fair to judge it by Douglas Adams's standard, but however you judge it it's awful.

3) On the other hand, some persons actually profess to like it. I can only suggest that not every Douglas Adams reader is capable of actually appreciating Douglas Adams, that some are merely pretending.

Do NOT pay money for this book. You have been warned.

"Starship Titanic" may be a slight science-fiction novel, but one shouldn't expect Homer's "Odyssey" out of story based on about a paragraph of writing from Douglas Adams' renowned "Hitchhiker's Trilogy". Even if it lacks a deep story or meaningful characters, "Starship Titanic" still has many things going for it. For starters, it's a short book, clocking in at a reasonable 256 pages and it reads very fast. Second, it was written by former Monty Pythonite, Terry Jones (in the nude, no less, according to the introduction), which gives it such and absurd, off-the-wall effect that one cannot help but be amused and drawn in by this book.

The story of a wayward luxury spaceliner that finds itself (and a few unwelcome passengers) transported from its planetary system to the one that houses Earth. Some earthbound humans end up boarding the ship for the adventure and then try frantically to get the ship to take them back home when they realize it's leaving Earth. On top of that, saboteurs from the other planetary system have planted a super-deluxe bomb aboard to destroy the ship. The humans want to get back home, the designers of the ship want to prevent the bombing to save their economy, and everyone is trying to figure why they can't seem to get an upgrade to First Class even though they're the only people on the ship. It's unbelievable the level of absurdity that takes place in this book, but there is no doubting how much fun it is. There is a space battle against a species that tries fix everything it damaged after a battle even though they don't fire weapons that can do any damage; there's an intriguing sexual encounter between the Journalist from the other system and a human female in the desperate seconds before they think the bomb will destroy them all and the subsequent attempts by the Journalist to get that female to repeat the performance; and then there's the bomb, itself. Lacking a special memory crystal, the countdown for this bomb cannot by stopped. Yet, it seems possible to distract him from the countdown, causing him to lose his place and have to start over again.

Having yet to read Adam's "Hitchhiker's Trilogy" (now at five books), I cannot comment as to how this little tale fits into the overall arc of that story and how it meshes with his writing style. That being said, Jones' Pythonesque influence makes this one of the craziest books to come along in awhile and definitely worth reading.