Red Dwarf 02 Better Than Life [Paperback]

In the meantime, Holly, the ship's computer, and Lister's insufferably talkative and chirpy Talky Toaster (patent applied for), get involved in trying to get Holly's IQ back into the quadruple digits like it was before, a process that invariably causes the computer's remaining time to exponentially decrease. Result, Holly shuts himself down to preserve what little remains of his life. Further result: the ship's powerless as a result. Further further result: a runaway planet is on a collision course with them.

However, one sobering aspect of the future that Grant and Naylor work into this novel is a garbage planet. One of the planets in the Solar System is chosen to house all the other planets' waste, and guest which planet that is? North America gets the bottles, Europe the sewage, Australia domestic waste, and Japan the graveyard of motorcars, etc.

Lister finds himself on this kind of planet, and attacked by lethal pollution storms by the planet itself. "Then he knew. He'd done everything to Earth. He'd crucified it. He was a member of the human race, part of the species that had spread like bacteria over the planet...finally rendering it fit only for use as a dumping ground for all humanity's garbage." Panic-stricken, he pleads for mercy, promising to make it right again." The concept of the Earth as a giant organism, with us unaware that it's organic is taken here. To that end, he forms an alliance with a creature most of us would immediately say hello to with the sole of our tennis shoes. This reminder of how we're polluting our planet is the best segment of the book, interesting for book derived from a comedy series.

A brief history of Earth's genetic mutations for new and weird sports, such as twenty-feet tall basketball players and soccer playres with five legs and no mouths, to sentient vacuum cleaners, wars against these creatures, later called GELFs (Genetically Engineered Life Forms) is given as an intro to a creature that appears in the TV story Polymorph. And GELFs are encountered in the 6th and 7th seasons.

Another insight into humans: "The thing about human beings was this: human beings couldn't agree. They couldn't agree about anything. ... And the reason was this: basically, all human beings believed all other human beings were insane, in varying degrees." That leads to wars, but by the 20th century, human beings "got so good at war, it couldn't have one anymore." Some of this Douglas Adams style humour is wry, and also appears in a section when Rimmer royally messes up by accidentally destroying a whole bunch of scutters (Red Dwarf's tiny arm-shaped service robots) in testing the engine's pistons.

Here are the stories worked into this novel:

Better Than Life, Season 2, Episode 2
White Hole, Season 4, Episode 4
Marooned, Season 3, Episode 2
Polymorph, Season 3, Episode 3
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX, Season 3, Episode X

Once again, revealing what that last story is would spoil the fun, but the sequel would actually take place in the fourth and not the third book.

Like its predecessor, it's more than just a TV tie-in, but an actual book that delves more into the personality of the characters, especially Lister.

The book takes a lot from the series. Similar situations. And it reads just as funny as the show. However, it seems to me the book takes a bunch of the show's funnier moments and tries to tie them all together. The result is a pretty jumpy story. If you decided to skip a chapter you would think you were reading an entirely different book.

These jumps don't at all take away from the hilarity. This book is good for several laugh out loud moments. Enjoy!