see also
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| Douglas Adams' Starship Titanic: A Novel (novel) | |
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| Created by | Douglas Adams/Terry Jones |
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| Video game(s) | The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1984) Starship Titanic (1997) |
ISBN 978-0-609601037 (13-digit)
ISBN 0330354469 (10-digit)
ISBN 978-0-330354462 (13-digit)
| Author | Terry Jones |
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| Publisher | Harmony Books,Pan Books, Ballantine Books |
Publication date | October 1997 |
| Pages | 256 (first edition) |
A novelization titled Douglas Adams's Starship Titanic of the game Starship Titanic conceived by Douglas Adams was written by Terry Jones (famous for his work in Monty Python's Flying Circus, but also voice actor for the parrot character in the original game) and published in October 1997 by Harmony Books and Pan Books, and in November 1998 by Ballantine Books. Adams initially intended to write the adaptation himself, but was too focused on the game. Robert Sheckley was then approached to write it, but his submitted work was rejected by The Digital Village in Autumn 1997 because it was too different from Adams's writing style. [1] Michael Bywater offered to write the novel after Sheckley abandoned the project, but, due to fears that Bywater would not complete the book on schedule, Adams ultimately asked Jones to write it as publishers expected the book's release to tie in with that of its source material (which itself ended up being delayed). [2] [3] Because of a tight schedule and postponing of the novel, Jones had to write it in the three weeks before its release date. The book sold about 80,000 copies. [2] Jones wrote it based on an outline provided by Adams. [4] Gerald Jonas of The New York Times Book Review wrote that Jones "successfully mimics Adams's antic style", but that the novel lacks the qualities that made Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series "memorable". [5] However, Publishers Weekly praised the book, describing it as a "rich medium of whimsy and satire" and writing that it succeeds in making readers laugh. [6] Reviewing the novel for School Library Journal , Robin Defendall also praised it and wrote that "it will be popular with [Jones's and Adams's] many fans". [7]
At the center of the galaxy, an unknown civilization is preparing for an event of epic proportions, the launch of the most technologically advanced spaceship ever built – the Starship Titanic. The ship that cannot possibly go wrong. Based on an idea of a cruise ship starship disaster mentioned by Adams in the novel Life, the Universe and Everything .
In the novel, the ship is sabotaged by Antar Brobostigan and his accountant Droot Scraliontis as part of an insurance fraud, and undergoes a Spontaneous Massive Existence Failure, crashing on Earth and recruiting three humans to help repair it. Similarly to the game, the main characters seek to upgrade their class status and fix the ship's central computer. The novel also includes subplots involving the on-board bomb and a love triangle between two of the human characters and a journalist from the planet Blerontin.
An audiobook was released in November 1997. [8] Trudi Miller Rosenblum of Billboard praised the audiobook's execution as "hilarious" and added that "there are plenty of wacky details and funny one-liners". [9]
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Douglas Noel Adams was an English author, screenwriter, essayist, humorist, satirist and dramatist. Adams was author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which originated in 1978 as a BBC radio comedy before developing into a "trilogy" of five books that sold more than 15 million copies in his lifetime and generated a television series, several stage plays, comics, a video game, and in 2005 a feature film. Adams's contribution to UK radio is commemorated in The Radio Academy's Hall of Fame.
Starship Troopers is a military science fiction novel by American writer Robert A. Heinlein. Written in a few weeks in reaction to the U.S. suspending nuclear tests, the story was first published as a two-part serial in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction as Starship Soldier, and published as a book by G. P. Putnam's Sons in December 1959.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a comedy science fiction series created by Douglas Adams. Originally a radio comedy broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 1978, it was later adapted to other formats, including stage shows, novels, comic books, a 1981 TV series, a 1984 video game, and 2005 feature film.
Starman Jones is a 1953 science fiction novel by Robert A. Heinlein about a farm boy who wants to go to the stars. It was first published by Charles Scribner's Sons as part of the Heinlein juveniles series.
The Salmon of Doubt: Hitchhiking the Galaxy One Last Time is a posthumous collection of previously published and unpublished material by Douglas Adams. It consists largely of essays about technology and life experiences, but its major selling point is the inclusion of the incomplete novel on which Adams was working at the time of his death, The Salmon of Doubt.
Science fiction comedy or comic science fiction is a subgenre of science fiction or science fantasy that exploits the science-fiction (SF) genre's conventions for comedic effect. Comic science fiction often mocks or satirizes standard SF conventions – such as alien invasion of Earth, interstellar travel, or futuristic technology. It can also satirize and criticize present-day society.
Starship Titanic is an adventure game developed by The Digital Village and published by Simon & Schuster Interactive. It was released in April 1998 for Microsoft Windows and in March 1999 for Apple Macintosh. The game takes place on the eponymous starship, which the player is tasked with repairing by locating the missing parts of its control system. The gameplay involves solving puzzles and speaking with the bots inside the ship. The game features a text parser similar to those of text adventure games with which the player can talk with characters.
Dragonlance is a shared universe created by Laura and Tracy Hickman, and expanded by Tracy Hickman and Margaret Weis under the direction of TSR, Inc. into a series of fantasy novels. The Hickmans conceived Dragonlance while driving in their car on the way to TSR for a job interview. At TSR Tracy Hickman met Margaret Weis, his future writing partner, and they gathered a group of associates to play the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game. The adventures during that game inspired a series of gaming modules, a series of novels, licensed products such as board games, and lead miniature figures.
Robert Sheckley was an American writer. First published in the science-fiction magazines of the 1950s, his numerous quick-witted stories and novels were famously unpredictable, absurdist, and broadly comical.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is the first of six books in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy comedy science fiction "trilogy" by Douglas Adams. The novel is an adaptation of the first four parts of Adams' radio series of the same name. The novel was first published in London on 12 October 1979. It sold 250,000 copies in the first three months.
Goosebumps is a series of children's horror fiction novels by American author R. L. Stine, published by Scholastic Publishing. The stories follow child characters, who find themselves in scary situations, usually involving monsters and other supernatural elements. From 1992 to 1997, sixty-two books were published under the Goosebumps umbrella title. Various spin-off series were written by Stine: Goosebumps Series 2000, Give Yourself Goosebumps, Tales to Give You Goosebumps, Goosebumps Triple Header, Goosebumps HorrorLand, Goosebumps Most Wanted and Goosebumps SlappyWorld. Another series, Goosebumps Gold, was never released. Goosebumps has spawned a television series and merchandise, as well as a series of feature films, starring Jack Black as Stine.
Oscar Chichoni is an Argentine illustrator of comic books and science fiction magazines and books.
The Wreck of the Titan: Or, Futility is a novella written by Morgan Robertson and published as Futility in 1898, and revised as The Wreck of the Titan in 1912. It features a fictional British ocean liner Titan that sinks in the North Atlantic after striking an iceberg. Titan and its sinking are famous for similarities to the passenger ship RMS Titanic and its sinking fourteen years later. After the sinking of Titanic the novel was reissued with some changes, particularly in the ship's gross tonnage.
Michael Bywater is an English non-fiction writer and broadcaster. He has worked for many London newspapers and periodicals and taken part in designing computer games.
NESFA Press is the publishing arm of the New England Science Fiction Association, Inc. The NESFA Press primarily produces three types of books:
The RMS Titanic has played a prominent role in popular culture since her sinking in 1912, with the loss of over 1,500 of the 2,200 lives on board. The disaster and the Titanic herself have been objects of public fascination for many years. They have inspired numerous books, plays, films, songs, poems, and works of art. The story has been interpreted in many overlapping ways, including as a symbol of technological hubris, as basis for fail-safe improvements, as a classic disaster tale, as an indictment of the class divisions of the time, and as romantic tragedies with personal heroism. It has inspired many moral, social and political metaphors and is regularly invoked as a cautionary tale of the limitations of modernity and ambition.
Batman: The Ultimate Evil is a novel written by Andrew Vachss and published in 1995 by the Warner Aspect imprint of Warner Books. Vachss was an attorney specializing in child abuse cases, as well as a crime novelist best known for his series of books featuring the character Burke, a private investigator who also takes on child abuse cases. A representative from DC Comics approached Vachss about the possibility of writing a novel featuring Batman. Viewing this as an opportunity to reach a completely different audience, Vachss agreed and wrote a draft. He continued with his themes concerning child sexual abuse and explored the topic of child sex tourism. The publisher required Vachss to follow certain rules, like making a clear distinction between fiction and reality and prohibiting the Batman character from killing, cursing, or having sex.
AudioFile is a print and online magazine whose mission is to review "unabridged and abridged audiobooks, original audio programs, commentary, and dramatizations in the spoken-word format. The focus of reviews is the audio presentation, not the critique of the written material." AudioFile is published six times a year in Portland, Maine.
The Expanse is a series of science fiction novels by James S. A. Corey, the joint pen name of authors Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck. The first novel, Leviathan Wakes, was nominated for the Hugo Award for Best Novel in 2012. The series as a whole was nominated for the Best Series Hugo Award in 2017.
The Mass Effect: Andromeda book series consists of a trilogy of science fiction novels based on the Mass Effect series of video games. The books in the series are Nexus Uprising (2017), Initiation (2017), and Annihilation (2018). All three books are released in paperback, e-book, and audiobook. The audiobook formats of Nexus Uprising and Initiation are narrated by Fryda Wolff, the voice of Sara Ryder, while the Annihilation audiobook is narrated by Tom Taylorson, the voice of Scott Ryder.