The Restaurant at The End of The Universe (#2)

This is the second book in the Hitchhiker's series and carries on with the wackily abstract storyline.

At 250 pages long (it seems shorter) it was first published in 1980 exactly one year after the original, which you definitely need to read to meet the crazy characters. I don't think this works properly as a standalone novel.

It gets five big nostalgic stars from me because of what it meant growing up as a teenager in Thatcher's Britain - hard politics, spoonfed capitalism and freezing cold winters - accompanied by Douglas Adams writing about men in dressing gowns hurtling through space, with intellectuals, two-headed swashbucklers, dizzy bimbos and jaw-droppingly stupid aliens.

It's sarcastic, cynical, frivolous and great fun. There's nothing really new going on in comparison to Hitchhikers, no amazing plot twists or mega action battles, but it's absolutely brilliant if you enjoy Douglas Adams and his strange, dry and very strange British humour.

There's a part of my soul hidden away in this series of books, somewhere at the end of the universe along with the answer to life: 42!