The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is, without a shadow of a doubt, the most famous science fiction radio series ever produced.

Written by Douglas Adams it followed the adventures of Arthur Dent, the last man alive, after the Earth was demolished by the Vogons in order to make way for a hyperspace bypass. As luck would have it, Arthur's friend Ford Prefect turned out to be an alien from Betelgeuse — rather than Guildford as had previously been stated — who set them both on a course that would see them encountering the two-headed, three-armed Zaphod Beeblebrox who had recently stolen a rather improbable spacecraft and who was accompanied by Marvin the paranoid android, and Tricia McMillan (aka Trillian).

Events following this are rather hazy as the radio series, television adaptation, movie, stage play and computer game all deviate from this starting point and begin to feed off each other in an ever increasing frenzy that is no doubt leading to the creation of an improbable number of parallel universes. Suffice to say that the search for the meaning of life, the universe and everything, the number 42, cups of tea, dolphins and the odd game of cricket are all connected to the series. And sometimes not...

Adams novelisations and novels based on the radio series have now sold millions of copies worldwide (in enough different editions that it'll take a better website than this to list them all...), with new adaptations of the final three of the five books appearing on BBC Radio 4 during 2004 and 2005.

Douglas Adam died, aged just 49, in May 2001.