Unfortunate waterfowl

I'd vowed not to touch Eoin Colfer's "And Another Thing" - billed as "Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy Part Six Of Three" - but curiousity and a bargain bin conspired to make a liar of me. It's clever, bordering on bloody clever. It's respectful in the sense that Colfer clearly knows the absurd source material backwards. It's also kinda tedious, especially in the latter stages, and there were times I thought about tossing it aside. The reason why is that it reads too much like an author trying to be clever and respectful on his way to an inevitable neat resolution. What it doesn't feel like is a proper story. There's certainly no sense of the endless possibility embodied in the concept of the Guide itself. Indeed, the abundant - some would say over-abundant - "H2G2" entries suffer from the same feeling of souless contrivance, however skilful. Don't bother with this novel, even if it's remaindered and you're itching to discover what happens next. I shouldn't have.