Number 42 - Last Chance to See - Douglas Adams & Mark Cawardine

 

Book number 42 in the year has to be Hitchhiker's Guide related, so here is the only book of Douglas Adams that I had managed never to read or own until now.

That's ironic because the only time i met Douglas Adams, it was at a signing tour for this book back in 1990. Unfortunately I was a poor student at the time and just had to settle for getting my radio scripts signed and I couldn't afford to buy this one.

The first Last Chance to See I ordered online turned out to be a follow up by Mark Cawardine and Stephen Fry with the main title in large letters and "following in the footsteps of Douglas Adams" in small print. serves me right for not reading the product description properly. Or indeed looking at the picture of Stephen Fry on the cover...

On my second try ordering it, I received this little beauty, a USA first edition that looks a lot longer than it  is because the paper is probably the thickest in any of the couple of thousand books in my house. 

Anyway... the book is a non fiction account of Douglas traveling to assorted remote locations around the world with naturalist Mark Cawardine to try to find and take pictures of assorted very rare animals for a BBC radio show.

I still remember Douglas telling the packed audience in Manchester Waterstones about the troubles involved in buying condoms in China (to protect a non waterproof microphone so they could put it in water) when you don't speak the language. It was one of the funniest moments of a very funny evening.  That anecdote is present in this book and is only one of many such anecdotes, all told with Douglas Adams' knack for finding the exact phrasing for maximum comic effect. 

I have received more than a few strange looks from people at work this last week for sitting in the lunch room giggling to myself. That's always a good sign when you're reading a comedic book.

This has its serious side as well. The whole book is about conservation of animals. The species they're looking for are some of the rarest creatures on Earth, and in general, the reason they're so rare is because of humans. This is a point that's hammered home time and time again. There is a sense of wonder when he meets the rhinos and  Komodo dragons.  The chapter about the kakapo parrots is poignant and funny at the same time.

This is a book that's going to stick with me for a long time.