The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (1980, ISBN 0345391810) is the second book in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy comedy science fiction series by Douglas Adams. It was originally published by Pan Books as a paperback. It takes its name from Milliways, the Restaurant at the End of the Universe, one of the settings of the book.

Synopsis

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The Restaurant at the End of the Universe continues the story from where The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy ended. Arthur Dent, Ford Prefect, Trillian, and Zaphod Beeblebrox have just left the planet Magrathea when they are attacked by a Vogon ship. Luckily, an ancestor of Zaphod's, Zaphod Beeblebrox the Fourth saves them, but Zaphod and Marvin oddly vanish, only to turn up at the offices of the Guide on Ursa Minor Beta. They are looking for Zarniwoop, who has gone on an intergalactic cruise in his office via his virtual universe. Arthur, Trillian and Ford are unaware of any of this, knowing only that the computer has been shut down, and only having received a message from a stalling Nutrimatic that says "Wait."

When Zaphod and Marvin reach the fifteenth floor of the Guide's office, half of the building is lifted off of the ground by Frogstar Fighters. A mysterious man named Roosta brings Zaphod to Zarniwoop's office, and they wait until they land on the barren wasteland of Frogstar World B, the most totally evil planet in the Universe. Roosta gives Zaphod final instructions before he leaves: go through the window on his way out, not the door. Zaphod leaves the building and meets Gargravarr, a mind that is getting a divorce with his body. Zaphod learns that his own mind is to be annihilated by the Total Perspective Vortex, a machine that shows you how infinitely small you are compared to the universe. When Zaphod enters, the Vortex shows him that he is the most important thing in the universe. Zaphod escapes, and ultimately finds a spaceliner still connected up and running in an abandoned spaceport after 900 years of delay, the passengers kept alive via intense life support. Zaphod finally meets Zarniwoop in the first class cabin on this spaceliner.

Zaphod apparently has been in the virtual universe, made by Zarniwoop and created specially for Zaphod, the entire time (in reality, the Total Perspective Vortex would have driven him insane like normal). It turns out that Zaphod had the shrunk Heart of Gold in his jacket pocket the whole time. It grows back to full size, and Zaphod is reunited with Trillian, Arthur and Ford. They escape from Zarniwoop after asking to be transported to the Restaurant at the End of the Universe. It turns out that Milliways, the Restaurant at the End of the Universe, was constructed on the ruins of Frogstar World B, and the four characters are reunited with Marvin, who had been waiting millions of years for them. When leaving the restaurant, Zaphod and Ford steal a spaceship, which turns out to be a stuntship belonging to Disaster Area, programmed to dive into a star to provide backing effects for a rock concert.

The only teleport on the ship has no guidance system, so they have to go wherever it takes them. Arthur and Ford end up in the Golgafrinchan Ark Fleet Ship B, which crash-lands on prehistoric Earth. While there, they realize that the travelers they have met are really the ancestors of modern humans. They are generally portrayed as bumbling fools who were tricked into leaving their former planet. They decide to invade another continent before they know what's on it, or why to invade it; and they hold a formalized town meeting session and establish a semi-bureaucracy before they have acquired the essential living elements such as fire and shelter. Arthur then attempts to determine the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe and Everything by reaching into a rabbit-skin Scrabble bag and pulling out letters randomly, hoping Deep Thought's computational matrix in Earth would have rubbed off on his subconscious. The letters spell "what do you get when you multiply six by nine" before running out. Besides being too obvious an question to the ultimate answer, six by nine is 54 not 42, implying an error occurred between the primate people (who spelt 42) and Arthur - possibly due to the arrival of the Golgafrinchans. Zaphod and Trillian return to the Heart of Gold, which is commandeered by Zarniwoop to complete his mission: to discover who really rules the Universe. (Marvin had to stay on the stunt ship to operate the teleport; he reappears in Life, the Universe and Everything on Sqornshellous Zeta after being rescued by a scrap metal merchant.)

Radio series

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The plot is based on the last eight Fits of the original radio series (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was based on the first four). The fragments of the plot are rearranged, and some do not appear at all. For example, Arthur and Ford were stranded on prehistoric Earth at the end of Fit the Sixth and later rescued; they are now stranded at the end of the book, and the episode of their rescue is deleted. The episodes taking place on the planet Brontitall are transferred to the Frogstar and hugely compressed, omitting several characters who do not appear elsewhere.

Most significantly, in the radio series the ship stolen from the Restaurant at the End of the Universe belonged not to Disaster Area, but to the admiral of the fleet of a warlike "hyper-evolutionary" race, who would evolve into any random shape in a matter of seconds. This evolutionary instability made them very jealous of stable life forms or as they called them "filthy rotten stinking same-lings". If for example one was drinking coffee and could not reach the sugar it would, with out a second thought evolve into something with much longer arms, but which was quite incapable of drinking the coffee.

In the original two radio series, Zaphod, Trillian and Marvin were all said to have escaped when the Hagunnenon Admiral "re-evolved" into an escape capsule. Zaphod wound up at the Hitchhiker's Guide offices, Trillian was married off and disappeared from the series, and Marvin wound up through "a string of adventures" before also arriving at the Hitchhiker's Guide offices. This was changed slightly in the 2004-05 radio series adaptations of the final three books: Zaphod and Trillian escaped back to the Heart of Gold together, and Marvin was left behind on the stolen Haggunenon Admiral's flagship, before being rescued.

1980 novels | Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy | Fictional restaurants

Das Restaurant am Ende des Universums | Le Dernier Restaurant avant la fin du monde | המסעדה שבסוף היקום | Restaurangen vid slutet av universum | Il ristorante al termine dell'universo