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New Hitchhiker Book in the Making.

Young Adult author Eoin Colfer has been chosen to write the sixth book in Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker Trilogy (yes, yes you read that right).

But why?

I have never read any of Colfer's books and I'm sure he must be a good writer but I doubt anybody could match up to Adams' wit and talent. The Hitchhiker series isn't even remembered for its story more than its jokes and clever wordplay so why bother continuing it?

I just hope Eoin Colfer is an atheist. Only an atheist can properly write another Hitchhiker novel!
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Comments

  1. Rebecca Ilham18/9/08 5:48 am

    Hey Ted,

    I am quite a Colfer's fan. I love his Artemis Fowl books (at least the first three that I've read) but I'm skeptical about this Hitchhiker's deal. Colfer obviously has a different sense of humor and I don't want my fondness of Adams' works be tainted at all.

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  2. Ted Mahsun18/9/08 11:20 am

    Thanks for telling me your thoughts on this. I was wondering what someone who's read Colfer (and Hitchhiker) would think about this.

    On my part, I don't think anyone can match Douglas Adams. He's too much of a genius.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Anonymous21/9/08 1:51 am

    I've only read the first Artemis Fowl book, and didn't like it one bit. So I was a little horrified when I found out that Colfer would be doing the next hitchhiker book. But then again, I'd be horrified if ANYONE (who is not Adams) writes a new hitchhiker book. Well... maybe Neil Gaiman would be okay. Or Terry Pratchett. But Colfer... well... I didn't find Artemis Fowl remotely funny, or interesting. A friend told me that it started out that way, and it gets better with each book, but just getting through the first book was torture for me. :/

    The bookseller in me hopes that it will sell well, although so far authors that make the transition from YA sci-fi/fantasy to plain old Sci-Fi/Fantasy don't sell as well as expected. Like D.B. Shan (Darren Shan)'s Procession of the Dead, or Stephenie Meyer's The Host. It's not that they don't sell, it's just that the numbers aren't anything like their YA book sales.

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  4. Ted Mahsun21/9/08 1:57 am

    I think Terry Pratchett would be a more suitable Douglas Adams surrogate. Not sure about Gaiman though. He can be funny but not Hitchhiker-style funny. But I haven't read most of his books so I say this with reservation.

    I did not realise that sf/fantasy YA authors who try to break into plain sf/fantasy territory don't sell well. That would explain why a lot of plain old sf/fantasy authors are crossing over into YA... that's where the gold is?

    In any case, I don't think Eoin Colfer would have a problem...the Hitchhiker "brand" is guaranteed to give him a certain amount of success regardless of what the fans might think of him and his writing.

    Heck, I'd probably just buy it out of curiousity... woe is me.

    ReplyDelete
  5. marineko23/9/08 10:38 pm

    I agree, Terry Pratchett is more suitable than Gaiman. I just realised that the funniest Gaiman I've read is Good Omens, which is (of course) co-written with Pratchett.

    Yes, the gold is definitely in YA. With all my core authors crossing over to YA, I'm in a perpetual tug-of-war to get books back from the YA section (^_^);

    Actually, I'm hoping more on Eoin Colfer's name to sell the book than the Hitchhiker "brand." Because not many of my sci-fi customers actually read the Hitchhiker books. In fact, the books might have disappeared from Kino altogether if I wasn't in charge of the section. It's very sad, but true. *sigh*

    And I'd probably buy the book, too. ( >_>)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Ted Mahsun24/9/08 5:27 am

    That is a bloody shame... maybe all the customers who are partial to Douglas Adams already have a copy of Hitchhiker's? I have at least two copies of the first book already...

    Maybe Eoin Colfer might help get a new generation reading Hitchhiker after all.

    ReplyDelete
  7. marineko24/9/08 9:44 am

    Haha... true... I have several copies of each, in different editions. And my sister has the omnibus edition.

    I'm really hoping that Colfer will get more people reading Hitchhiker, yes.

    ReplyDelete

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