Douglas Adams's Starship Titanic

By Terry Jones

During this completely gratifying and fully disorienting novel in keeping with a narrative line through Douglas Adams (author of The Hitchhiker's advisor to the Galaxy), Terry Jones recounts an unforgettable story of intergalactic trip and mishap. The saga of "the send that can't very likely cross wrong" glints with wit, possibility, and confusion that might maintain readers guessing which fact they're in and the way, on the earth, to discover their approach out again.

At the heart of the galaxy, an unlimited, unknown civilization is getting ready for an occasion of epic proportions: the launching of the best, so much lovely, such a lot technologically complicated Starship ever built-the Starship Titanic.

An earthling could see it as a mix of the Chrysler construction, the tomb of Tutankhamen, and Venice. yet much less provincial onlookers could realize it because the layout of Leovinus, the galaxy's most famous architect. he's an previous guy now, and the production of the Starship enormous is the top fulfillment of his twenty-year career.

The evening earlier than the release, Leovinus is prowling round the send having a final little glance. With mounting alarm he starts to discover issues aren't correct: unfinished workmanship, cybersystems now not operating effectively, robots colliding with doorways. How may well this have occurred? and the way might this have occurred with no his knowing?

Something someplace is extremely wrong.

On tomorrow, in a synthetic occasion staged for the media, the Starship monstrous will go away its development dock lower than autopilot and, a couple of days later, make its approach to the terminal to choose up passengers for its maiden voyage. even supposing the send can be abandoned in the course of its first actual flight, it really is however a massive occasion, watched via all of the galaxy's media.

Hugely, magnificently, the awesome send eases its method ahead from the development dock, alternatives up velocity, sways a section, wobbles a piece, veers wildly, and prior to it may do tremendous harm to every thing round it, appears to be like to suffer SMEF (Spontaneous monstrous lifestyles Failure).

In simply ten seconds, the entire, stupendous company is over. And our tale has simply begun.

Somehow 3 earthlings, one Blerontin journalist, a semideranged parrot, and a shipful of disoriented robots needs to triumph over their changes. It's the one solution to retailer the Starship giant ("The send that can't in all probability cross Wrong") from sure destruction and rescue the economic system of a complete planet-not to say to outlive the most recent chance, an assault by way of a swarm of adversarial shipbuilders.

Show description

Quick preview of Douglas Adams's Starship Titanic PDF

Best Humor books

The Serpent of Venice: A Novel

Manhattan occasions bestselling writer Christopher Moore channels William Shakespeare and Edgar Allan Poe within the Serpent of Venice, a satiric Venetian gothic that brings again the Pocket of puppy Snogging, the eponymous hero of idiot, with his sidekick, Drool, and puppy monkey, Jeff. Venice, many years in the past.

How to Archer: The Ultimate Guide to Espionage and Style and Women and Also Cocktails Ever Written

Mendacity is like ninety five% of what I do. yet think me: during this e-book, I’ll tell you precisely find out how to turn into a grasp secret agent similar to me. evidently, you won’t be nearly as good at it as i'm, yet that’s simply because you’re you, and I’m Sterling Archer. i do know, i do know, it sucks now not being me. yet don’t beat your self up approximately it, simply because I’m going to teach you the entire solid stuff—what to put on; what to drink; how one can seduce ladies (and, whilst invaluable, men); tips to beat up males (and, while priceless, women); find out how to inform the variation among name ladies and hookers (hint: while they’re useless, they’re simply hookers) and every thing approximately guns, mystery units, mendacity ex-girlfriends, and turtlenecks.

Feet of Clay: A Novel of Discworld

It is homicide in Discworld! —which typically is not any vast deal. yet what bothers Watch Commander Sir Sam Vimes is that the weird deaths of 3 aged Ankh-Morporkians don't undergo the fresh, effective marks of the Assassins' Guild. An obvious loss of any purpose is usually particularly troubling. All Vimes has are a few tracks of white clay and extra of these bothersome "clue" issues that merely serve to muck up an research.

Bearded Tit

A poignant yet hilarious trip into the arcane global of birdwatching by means of the most renowned names in British comedy, Bearded Tit is Rory McGrath’s tale of existence between birds. From a Cornish boyhood wandering gorse-tipped cliffs hearing the music of the yellowhammer together with his imaginary female friend, or drawing gravity-defying jackdaws at school whilst he must have been employing himself to physics, to quoting the Latin names of birds to provide himself a battling likelihood with the main appealing woman he had ever obvious.

Extra resources for Douglas Adams's Starship Titanic

Show sample text content

How come you converse English? " Dan felt higher now that he’d chanced on anything concrete to question. "I beg your pardon, yet i'm really not talking ... what did you say-’English’? All robot features in this send are outfitted with infraviolet translation sensors which immediately test the mind impulses of passengers for language styles. those styles are then rearranged inside of your heads so you might comprehend and converse intelligibly whereas at the send. you're really talking and figuring out Blerontinian. beautiful handy for writers of technology fiction, huh? " Dan wasn’t convinced what to make of this final remark-was the robotic inferring that he used to be not anything greater than a figment of a few writer’s brain and that this complete factor used to be probably not occurring? besides the fact that, prior to he may perhaps imagine from now on alongside those strains, his brain used to be beaten by means of the wonderful scenario within which they now came upon themselves: they have been rushing vertically up the immense keel towards the most physique of the Starship, a mile above the skin of the Earth. Nigel stabbed out a bunch on his cellular, and referred to as halfheartedly out of the automobile window: "Dan? Lucy? Nettie? " yet his voice slightly reached the crumbled brickwork of the ruined residence. the following second he heard a ghostly roar, like seas beating on a distant shore. "Hello? " stated his cellular. "Oxford Police Station. am i able to assist you? " Nigel didn’t answer. He used to be too busy looking at the giant incredible factor because it rose up into the air back and disappeared towards the Milky method. "Hello? this can be Oxford Police Station," insisted his cellphone. "Who is that this? " Nigel checked out the smashed Victorian vicarage, and the driveway the place his buddies had stood a number of moments in the past, and changed his cellular on its cradle. "It didn’t happen," he murmured to himself. "It didn’t take place. " you have got concept there has been a tinge of aid within the manner his shoulders secure, yet in fact you'll have brushed off such an idea as overall delusion. at the least, at that very same second, Nigel unexpectedly grew to become very unrelaxed certainly. actually, he virtually jumped out of his Armani trousers; he definitely hit his head at the roof of the auto. "Ouch! " he yelled. An previous guy with a flowing white beard used to be sitting quietly within the passenger seat; there have been tears in his eyes and considered one of his eyebrows was once with regards to to fall off. nine the instant the send took off, Dan felt a sinking feeling in his abdominal. This used to be, in fact, easily the results of the really good g strength that was once being exerted upon his physique. yet Dan, who had no concept that the send had taken off, in simple terms proposal he was once getting frightened. The sinking feeling within the abdominal used to be quick through a draining of blood from the mind, resulting in temporary light-headedness, by way of overall blackout. If he hadn’t simply handed out, Dan may have spotted that the takeoff had affected Lucy and Nettie in an analogous way—even notwithstanding none of them knew what was once taking place. "Nothing to be alarmed approximately, sir, madam, and thing," the well mannered robotic addressing this final on the now comatose Nettie.

Download PDF sample

Rated 4.69 of 5 – based on 5 votes