As a long-time fan of the show, I couldn’t pass up the chance to read the novel that started it all. The problem with being a fan of the show first is finding a way to comment on the book as a standalone thing, not in comparison to the TV series that came after it. It’s hard to draw the line at knowing how much I enjoyed the book for its own sake and how much I enjoyed it because it took me back to the days of watching British comedy on YTV at night.

On one hand, the humour in the book was great, subtle in some places and wonderfully over-the-top in others. I was reminded of Douglas Adams at some points, which probably speaks well for Naylor’s ability to make the absurd seem normal and the normal seem pretty darn laughable when you get right down to it. On the other hand, as a whole the writing style didn’t seem particularly distinguishable. I doubt I’d be able to look at a piece of Naylor’s writing and go, “Aha, that was written by Grant Naylor, no doubt about it.”

That being said, though, it isn’t as though I didn’t enjoy the book. When compared to the show, it added background information to characters, made them see a little less like characters and more like people with very strange but entirely believable personality quirks. And I certainly want to be able to read the rest of the Red Dwarf books whenever I’m able to, and not just for nostalgia purposes, either.

This isn’t a book I would recommend to someone right off the bat; I think it’s best for fans of the show to read, really, or someone who enjoys space comedy (and there aren’t too many of that kind of book around, really). Enjoyable, but not spectacular unless you already know you’ll like it.