Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency by Douglas Adams, author of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, is a much-loved cult classic, that has spawned radio dramas, television, theatre and comic book adaptations across the globe.

Book blurb

What do a dead cat, a computer whiz-kid, an Electric Monk who believes the world is pink, quantum mechanics, a Chronologist over two hundred years old, Samuel Taylor Coleridge (poet), and pizza have in common?

Apparently not much; until Dirk Gently, self-styled private investigator, sets out to prove the fundamental interconnectedness of all things by solving a mysterious murder, assisting a mysterious professor, unravelling a mysterious mystery, and eating a lot of pizza – not to mention saving the entire human race from extinction along the way (at no extra charge).

To find out more, read this book (better still, buy it then read it) – or contact Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency.

My thoughts

This is quite a crazy book and initially, at least, one that takes a bit to get your head around it so don’t be surprised if you find yourself wondering what’s going on or even skim reading the more quirky or dare I say outlandish sections in the book. If you’re a sci-fi or fantasy fan you will probably really enjoy reading those parts.

For me, as a crime fiction fan, I only began to settle into Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency after the ‘murder’ takes place and as it is ‘investigated’ by Dirk and Richard. Not that this was anything like a normal investigation of course!

The story had its humorous moments and allowing some elements to wash over me I enjoyed it in parts, yes but mainly no I didn’t love it. It’s not the sort of book I would normally pick up and not all books are for everyone but I am glad I finished it.

Book: Purchased

A Virtual Crime Book Club

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Club was The Virtual Crime Fiction Club read for our meeting on Monday, 9th June.

Author Rebecca Bradley hosts the meetings which are usually posted on YouTube. Be aware that there may be spoilers in the video so perhaps don’t watch if you haven’t read the book but do intend to in the future.

 If you are interested in joining you can sign up HERE. (This is so you can be sent the meeting room details prior to the meeting.)

20 Books of Summer 2025

Information

Published: Pan MacMillan | 2021 | ISBN 978-0-3305-1418-7 | 280pp

First published 1987 by William Heinemann Ltd This electronic edition published 2021 by Pan Books an imprint of Pan Macmillan

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency was published in 1987, and was described by its author as “a kind of ghost-horror-detective-time-travel-romantic-comedy-epic, mainly concerned with mud, music and quantum mechanics”.

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Author

Douglas Adams was born in 1952 and created all the various and contradictory manifestations of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: radio, novels, TV, computer games, stage adaptations, comic book, and bath towel.

He was born in Cambridge and lived with his wife and daughter in Islington, London, before moving to Santa Barbara, California, where he died suddenly in 2001.

Douglas Adams – website

Frequently Asked Questions – FAQ

Douglas Adams – Wikipedia page

BOOKS BY DOUGLAS ADAMS

The Hitchhiker trilogy

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy | The Restaurant at the End of the Universe | Life, the Universe and Everything

So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

Mostly Harmless

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: The Original Radio Scripts

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Radio Scripts: the Tertiary, Quandary and Quintessential Phases

The Dirk Gently series

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency | The Long Dark Tea-time of the Soul

Collected works

The Salmon of Doubt

With John Lloyd

The Meaning of Liff | The Deeper Meaning of Liff

With Mark Carwardine

Last Chance to See . . .

By Terry Jones, based on a story/computer game by Douglas Adams

Douglas Adams’s Starship Titanic