PKD is my number-one writer, both for style, but more particularly for ideas. There is so much in this book that shows the man was a thinker, an explorer of ideas not just for the novels and short stories he could generate from them. With PKD, ideas developed a unique philosophy which is why his fiction is founded on such a firm basis. Even when his ideas change and we can see the change (for example 'The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch' and 'A Scanner Darkly') there is no contradiction involved, just a clear evolution. For PKD fans who haven't yet read his non-SF novels I encourage you to do so - I would be surprised if you were disappointed.

PKD has also left a great legacy of pithy quotes - such as 'reality is what is left behind when you stop believing in something'. My favourite, however, he wrote in a forward to one of the anthologies of short stories. He said that science fiction is not about 'what if ......' it's about 'My God! what if .....'.

There is a lot of this in his philosophy too.

While I've read this entire book cover-to-cover, I have probably read the last half (Part Five: Essays and Speeches, and Part Six: Selections from the Exegesis) at least four times. That's where the real philosophy is. Or perhaps I should say the real mysticism. Actually, P.D.K.'s thought was a combination of philosophy and mysticism, not unlike the works of Pythagoras or Plato. Indeed, I would not hesitate to place him in such exalted company.
Dick's Gnosticism is the Gnostisism of true revelation, of epiphany and theogony (of union with the divine.) Yes, some people arrogantly write this off as the rantings of a "schizophenic", but then they would no doubt apply that same meaningless, garbage diagnosis to every great mystic teacher or shaman.
Here you get the revelations of his novel ,_Valis_, developed and fleshed out in a much more satisfying manner. Indeed, unless you are fortunate enough to track down a copy of his mythical _Exegesis_ this is the best expression of his thought that you will find.
One last note, as much as I agree with the gnostic idea of a transcedent God (or Logos, or Tao) breaking through into our material "Black Iron Prison", I do have a problem with his concept of a Yaldaboath (i.e. deranged, lesser, creator god.) You see, human materialistic, hyper-rational, civilization functions as such a lesser "god." Have we not made money, science, and ego into idols that are worshipped in their own right to the exclusion of the the true transcendant God? You simply do not need to posit the existance of such a supernatural demiurge, devil, or "Moloch" (as Ginsberg called it.) Human ignorance and evil are quite up to the role.
Oh yes, P.D.K.'s motto of "The Empire Never Ended", is taking on new revelence these days....

THE SHIFTING REALITIES OF PKD is a perfect title for this material. It was in his speeches to college students that PKD exposed his mental terrain--holding little back. Here he discussed his two obsessions: What is reality? & What constitutes an authentic human? This material shows how Dick used his sci-fi novels to poke holes in simpler cosmologies. Dick made the universe his own sandbox.

In THE ANDROID & THE HUMAN he says that free will may be an illusion. Were humans also controlled by tropisms that are so evident in the growth of plants? He sounded out his greatest fear as 'The reduction of humans to mere use--men made into machines, ... what I regard as the greatest evil imaginable.' Dick saw the time to come when a writer would be stopped not by unplugging his electric keyboard but by someone unplugging the man himself.

In MAN, ANDROID & MACHINE Dick found a hopeful theory at the end of his dark tunnel. In this essay he discussed Teilhard De Chardin's Noosphere, 'composed of holographic & informational projections in a unified and continually processed Gestalt,'--a summation of the globe's intelligence. Dick never worried about the label 'made in a laboratory.... the entire universe is one vast laboratory,' he writes. Here he also lays bare his own reality--one composed of a series of crystallized dreams. He cites Ursula Le Guin's THE LATHE OF HEAVEN as his model for 'understanding the nature of our world'. He adds: 'I myself have derived much of the material for my writing from dreams.' PKD challenged the reader to pry beneath the facade of daily existence and knead the silly putty of the dream world into some recognized shape.

The 1957 EYE IN THE SKY is one of the first Philip K. Dick's books you should read if you still don't know this american writer. If I'm not mistaken, it was the first time that Philip K. Dick, in a novel, was treating the theme of the virtual realities.

Eight persons, while visiting the Bevatron, the only pure science-fiction element of the novel, are trapped in a time hole after having accidentally been hit by the Bevatron ray. They wake up in a world that at first is pretty much the same than the one they have just left but they soon realize that they are caught in a world entirely created by the phantasms of one of them.

One can like THE EYE OF THE SKY for numerous good reasons such, for instance, as the slight favour of Agatha Christie's " and then they were none " in it, the reader waiting anxiously for the next imaginary world to appear and the clues that will lead him to the identity of the new dreamer's name. One can also appreciate this book for its critique of the late fifties's american society : The Mc Carthy syndrome, the anti-communism paranoïa or the wave of the evangelism don't have the slightest chance under Philip K. Dick's cruel pen.

With this book, PKD revealed himself as the first class writer he will be during the sixties.

A book for a future PKD fan.

The first few pages of the book set the tone: since Marsha Hamilton challenges the 'reality' as considered by the official authorities (she seems to have ties with communists), she is deemed 'dangerous'. Meanwhile, the main ideas behind the plot clearly make 'Eye in the Sky' a variation on Plato's allegory of the cave: after an explosion at the Belmont bevatron, eight people are knocked uncounscious; as each person slowly regains consciousness, they all experience his/her world of opinions and preconceptions. The first is the fanatical, manichean world of an old soldier. The eight characters are akin to Plato's prisoners, both physically (they lie down in the bevatron, numb and motionless) and mentally (they go through successive worlds of unstable appearances). But most of them are prisoners who hope to free themselves from their chains: although some don't mind these subjective worlds at first, they frequently acknowledge the urgent need to wake up and escape this unpredictable cycle. Reading the book, some might come to the conclusion that Dick's point of view is relativist, and that 'reality' seems to take the form of our varying perceptions and thus can't be pinpointed in absolute terms, but I'd argue that he's not satisfied with such an easy way out. Some of the characters certainly aren't: after escaping these subjective worlds of fantasms, they aren't perfectly comfortable with the physical world either and want to change it. In the end, Dick doesn't provide definitive answers as to what reality is, but by challenging preconceived - and mainly physical - notions of reality, this book acts as a detoxifying antidote; the exact same way he described his own work in his Exegesis.

The point of the novel, like so much of PKD's work, is centered on the issue of what is Real and what is perception. This is one that has a "science" concept at the front of the novel that is quickly dispatched(the beam machine is just an effect, and PKD shows it as such) but the story is about how each of us is in our own little perceptual world, defined more by who we really are than anything else.

The single most valuable piece in this volume is the shot by shot analysis from a laser disc version of the film. This study is worth the price of the book. Kerman has done a fine job of coordinating her contributors in order to prevent repetition, nevertheless, the separate writers unavoidably discuss certain key moments with negligible differences in their opinions. In addition to bordering on monotony, such repetition becomes frustrating in a couple of instances where each author has settled on a misinterpretation of the film. For instance, these writers accept that Rachel's memories are Tyrell's niece's. Quite clearly, Harrison Ford's delivery of the words, "Tyrell's niece's" suggests that he is speculating or offering an absurd example for an absurd reality. Certainly one is hard-pressed to imagine some woman allowing her uncle to use her awkward sexual experiences as an operating platform in the latest model of his vastly successful androids. On other issues, the commentators diverge, as when the superimposed eye from the opening is attributed to various characters. Such differences of opinion are rare, but they add a considerable spark to the collection when they do occur.
The volume could use another edition which adds more discussion of the director's cut. The current volume only fits in a few short pieces at the very end, whereas most of the book is devoted to the original version. For serious enthusiasts of this film, there is a great joy in these pages to read the thoughts of other people who've thought about "Blade Runner" as much as you have. Like the film itself, though, the perfect version of this book probably has yet to emerge.

I thought my 10 year career as Blade Runner appreciator would have overturned all the 'stones' of interest - and yet this book yields countless articles many of which containing subtleties and revelations totally new to me. Of course, if you're not a major blade runner fan you'll want to become one first.

A must have for any die hard BR fan. Well crafted essays and opinions covering every angle a fan could ever hope for. Reads similar to a textbook. If only Scott could release a DVD version of BR this detailed.

Two things were always true with Philip K. Dick: first, that whenever you looked in the direction in which he waves his wand, nothing was as it seems. And second, that whenever you looked at the magician himself, what you saw was what you got.

In this collection of transcripts of taped interviews, made with Dick during what turned out to be his last weeks on earth, we are treated to the unedited, off-the-cuff ramblings of the master. Are they worth it? They are, on at least four counts.

The first pleasure is just hearing his voice again. The second is learning various little bits that we didn't know before: about his reactions to seeing the first rushes of _Blade Runner_, which was just going into editing (he was pleased and enthusiastic, and not at all put out that the whole Mercerism theme was excised.) And about the book he was planning to begin next, The Owl in Daylight. The third pleasure is watching his creative process unfold as he massages the material for _The Owl_, plotting it and composing it right before our eyes. And the fourth is the confirmation that he is as quirky, as compassionate, as obsessed, as unpredictable, as brilliant, when speaking ad libitum as he was in his written work. What we saw in his novels turns out to be what his friends always got.

Other major themes include his 1974 "pink light" experience, and his relationship with the characters in his last novel, The Transmigration of Timothy Archer.

For the completist fan, this short book is a delightful find, and one worth snapping up quick since there's no telling how long it'll be in print. But for those with only a few PKD novels under their belts, and a curiosity about what made him tick, there's a far more indispensable volume to check out first, namely the extracts from his diaries which were published in 1991 as "In Pursuit of Valis: Selections from the Exegesis".

...And,if you read this book you'll realize just what a crying shame it truly is...The world was cheated out of "The Owl in daylight",a book that just might have ended up being his greatest. This book,(What if our world is their Heaven?)is simply a transcription of some tape interviews PKD made shortly before his untimely death in 1982.Of course this could be seen by the cynical as an attempt by those in the late PKD's circle of friends to somehow cash in on the mystique that surrounds this enigmatic science fiction legend,Its a quick read...not terribly lengthy...but the true genius of this book is the glimpse a hardcore PKD fan can get of two things...One,"The Owl in Daylight",still in the conceptual phase at the time of his death(Oh,why oh,why'd ya have die Phil?) Two,just how quickly this man's mind worked,especially as to regards the way he wrote a novel(ABSOLUTELY mind boggling).I will say that If you haven't read the Sutin Bio,parts of PKD's exegesis and I'd say,at least 10 or so of his key works you may not get a whole lot of enjoyment out of this book,But a real delight for the hardcore fan as well as a heartbreaking reminder of all the great books we could of had in the last 20 years if Phil was still around.

Reading this book is like sitting down to a one-on-one conversation with Philip K. Dick. His unique and surprisingly upbeat personality shines though more here than in any biography. Despite personal trials and delusions Philip K. Dick retained a sense of humor and it's fascinating to hear that come through in his own words. I appreciate the fragmented sentences and "and um's" left intact because they truly convey the atmosphere of being in a room listing to Philip K. Dick. One of the most interesting things about reading this book is seeing Philip K. Dick's momentum and thought progression as he plots out a story idea (tragically one that he never had time to finish.) His interpretation of the well-known interferences in his life from either extraterrestrial or divine sources is fascinating but somewhat brief, it seems not to overshadow his existence, but merely become another accepted aspect of it. This book brings this sci-fi legend into human terms. For those interested in Philip K. Dick's personality this book is probably the most authentic and enlightening available.

The PKD reader is an excellent introduction to this seminal SF author's short fiction. Most all of his major pieces are here, as well as some enjoyable underrated works. Mr. Dick's greatness is shown here by the stories in this volume. Also, there are four (at least) movies or potential movies made from the stories here. It's not uncommon for an SF novel to be made into a movie, but a short story is something else again. And yet, from the wonderful "We Can Remember It For You, Wholesale" (a classic Dick story) the classic SF film Total Recall was made; likewise for Screamers from "Second Variety. Steven Spielberg is currently filming "The Minority Report" with Tom Cruise. "Paycheck" has been optioned. All four of these stories are excellent, top-notch science fiction. "Minority", in particular, is awesome, and stands as one of my all-time favorite pieces of short SF. One can also see, during the course of reading this book, just how much Philip K. Dick grew as a writer during his career. Early stories featured here such as "Fair Game" and "The Hanging Stranger" while certainly good, have a VERY pulp-ish feel. This is offset by wonderful later stories such as the one mentioned, and other such as "The Father-Thing", "The Last of The Masters", and "War Veteran." Dick's writing style is compelling, fast-paced, readable, and thought-provoking, and you can see why he is held in such high regard by fans and critics alike. These are some of the best SF shorts written since the likes of Heinlein and Clarke ruled the roost. It's sad that he only started receiving real recognition after his untimely death in 1982 (just before Blade Runner was released. Pick up this book, and see why it has been said that "100 years from now, Philip K. Dick may be looked back upon as the greatest writer of the second half of the 20th century."

My first intro to philip k dick was at the end credits of of the film "bladerunner"...where i saw his name in small print...thus, i picked up this volume with some passing curiousity only to discover with pleasure, that within it's pages was another story made into the film "we can remember it for you wholesale". i thoroughly enjoyed the story in it's own right and proceeded to find another story called "second variety" which also became a film.Between stories i was hooked...in no time i was reading other great stories in this collection, such as "minority report"-which has been ruined by the overdone version of it for the screen...too bad....
anyway i found myself immersed in a world where the paths of dreams and reality were so confusing and thought provoking ...this volume is a collection of earlier works, and i think it's one of the best places to start; but the best, i think, is to be found in his latter longer works such as "do androids dream of electric sheep' and "the three stigmata...'....this volume is like an appetizer that may make you want to read pkd to the furthermost...

Might someone please list the stories included in this volume? I really don't need editorial, just the titles. I can't exactly purchase something if I don't know what I'll be getting.

This is Lawrence Sutin's best book (well, of the three that I've read). It's also the best book on Dick I've found, and it's about as engrossing as some of Dick's better novels. There's a lot of stuff in here, but I wolfed it down pretty quickly.

The various troubled relationships, paranoid experiences (and attitudes), drug experimentation, and transcendental experiences are discussed here in some detail. We get lots of stories from Dick's ex-wives and such discussing his writing habits and nervous behavior.

I found particularly helpful the bibliography (with plot summaries) at the end of the book. It's depressing how much of Dick's work is still out of print.

A great book on a great American writer. Anyone who wants to go further might look at IN SEARCH OF VALIS, also by Sutin.

Sutin's sometimes sarcastic style might surprise the reader at first, but this is a very insightful look at the life and work of Philip K. Dick - it's also the most substantial book of its kind we have yet. Sutin does a good job of inserting his comments about the works while sharing with us their genesis at the same time; the analysis aspect of 'Divine Invasions' is fairly limited, but since it's not a scholarly book, it doesn't disappoint. It reads somewhat like PKD's own novels and short stories, with Dick himself as the central character. The extracts from the Exegesis show PKD at his speculative best and made me want to read more. One more note: in the last section, Sutin offers a 'guide' in which he rates PKD's books on a 1-10 internal scale, also providing capsule reviews of the works he didn't write about in the main narrative; it's sure to provoke arguments, as he thought it would. Serious PKD readers should definitely read this.

Sutin, who obviously did his homework, begins with the loss of a twin sister when Philip K. Dick was an infant, and develops the idea that this had a profound influence on his life and his writing. He weaves literary and psychological insights together to explain Dick's entire career and the themes of his books. Sutin also proposes a plausible theory (bringing medical and psychological facts together) about the source of the "VALIS" experience, which was the major event of Dick's adult life and the impetus for some of his strangest, best, and most difficult books. Along the way, Sutin manages to put Dick's life in context of the times (especially the counterculture of the 60's) while making it clear that he was very much outside the times. It's too bad this is out of print, and I hope it's reissued someday.

With the appearance of the movie I just had to read the story again. 'The Minority Report' is a clever story and it does show tentative grasping at topics that were later to become so seminal in all of Philip Dick's work. What is real? Would an ability to see the future consolidate reality before it even happened? Not so according to this story, because there are ways of seeing and times of seeing.

With 'Blade Runner' a successful movie with a 'cops'n'robbers' theme, I guess this one just had to follow. I haven't seen the movie yet, so I make no comment in advance, but I am encouraged that the title is preserved (unlike 'Blade Runner' or 'Total Recall') and so is the lead character's name. Unfortunately the renaming of the precogs, as I have read in reviews of the film, does seem rather weak.

Of course, in all collections of stories, different readers will have different favourites. In this collection I particularly like 'Autofac' but for sheer humour and unpredictability my favourite is 'If There Were No Benny Cemoli'. Now, what a movie that story could make!

I have often seen hawked about the notion that the work of Philip Dick is a precursor to cyberpunk. Personally I loathe cyberpunk and yet Philip Dick is my favourite author. Have I missed soemthing here?

In this fourth volume of the five-book collection of Dick's short stories, it is put forth (in the amusing "Waterspider") that science fiction authors are actually pre-cognitive. In a later story, PKD himself foretells Richard Nixon's election to the Presidency in 1968...four years before the event! Probably a lucky guess, but who knows....

This collection comprises stories written in the late 1950s and early '60s, a period when Dick was also taking off as a novelist. Some of this has had an influence on his short stories, which are generally longer than before, and which, in some cases are early versions of what would eventually become novels such as the Simulacra and the Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch.

Generally speaking, these are all good to great stories. The title story - made into a movie last year - is a clever little mystery, and that is just one of the gems within. Although most of the stories are disconnected, many involve precognition and most have a bit of dark humor running them. Some - such as Orpheus with Clay Feet - are strictly humorous, while others are far more serious.

As with the other volumes in this series, this is a great collection with very little in the way of bad stories - quite an accomplishment considering how quickly some of these were cranked out. For fans of science fiction, especially the off-beat sort which was Dick's specialty, this is highly recommended.

I have to say this book was great. I loved the twist and turns of the plot in the book. Some of the ideas are way out there, like the concept of "Pre-Murder". Only one auther would dare touch these ideas and make it into a great story. PKD's short stories are great. WHich seem to be popular in the movie business. This short story Minority Report is soon to be a Steven Spielburg movie. Just Great.

This book, a story about a TV repairman and his family in 1950's California, contains many of the elements contained in Dick's science fiction novels: bleak emotional landscapes; the aggressive wife; the everyman character stuggling to get by in the world. But it's missing the inventiveness, the creepiness, and also the humor of his SF work. This one dragged for me, a bit, though it does contain some memorable characters.

This is one of several non-science fiction novels Dick wrote in the 1950s in an attempt to gain recognition as a serious writer. It didn't work (while he was still living), and he went back to solid SF at some point. This one is worth reading for sure if you like PKD, but it's not up there with his very best science fiction.

I loved this novel. The reactions the adulterers experience after their one 'affair' are so atypical of drama, film, TV but I suspect so accurate of human life. We can all learn many things from reading Dick's novels - both SF and otherwise. Somehow - even in extreme environments (which this novel does not show) - he shows everyday reality of the human mind.

I have a soft spot for this bleakly realistic novel about California life in the 1950's. The main characters are little people, anti-heroes, average Joes, but Dick's psychological insights are superb and singular. I remember one character's description of being popular in elementary school for two days because of making ears from breadcrusts and causing everyone to laugh; and a brilliantly believable internal monologue about getting caught in the act of adultery. Dick's evocations are haunting. He truly was capable of finding the unique and the universal in the quotidian realities of modern life, even when disguised by a wacky SF alternative-realm framework (not here, though). PUTTERING is straight slice-of-life.

I wish someone would make this one into a movie. It's bittersweet, evocative--filled with character like an aged burgundy. Read it.

PKD's "Now Wait for Last Year" features the author's unparalleled inventiveness at less than its peak form. The novel's action unfolds on a mid 21st century Earth in which Terrans have allied with alien ancestors from the Alpha Centaurus world Lilistar to levy war against insectoid extraterrestrials called reegs. The war is waged partially through use of the drug JJ-180, which allows its ingestors to travel through time at the cost of unbreakable addiction and irreversible brain damage. While fighting in this conflict, the novel's protagonist, Dr. Eric Sweetscent, engages in a personal struggle against his self-destructive tendencies.

Like a precocious toddler who completely devours one toy and impatiently grabs another, PKD introduces and discards ideas on nearly every page of the opening chapters of this book. A race of alien mimics supporting a synthetic fur industry, an apparently telepathic politician who communes through physical contact, "babylands," exact replicas of a person's birthplace, a fad among the moneyed class, all ideas that might independently feature in their own novels but are abandoned after minimal treatment in "Now Wait for Last Year." The plot deteriorates halfway through the book, and the latter chapters consist largely of Dr. Sweetscent traveling forward in time to query future selves about the outcome of his external and internal struggles.

Although not as focused as his better novels, PKD's "Now Wait for Last Year" presents a vivid and detailed future that should interest most SF fans. As with all of his work, this book contains PKD's remarkable insight into human character and hopeful view of mankind's future, a view rendered quite powerful by his intimate familiarity with all of man's flaws and wrinkles, and his optimism despite these defects.

This is a very engaging novel typically for Philip Dick being centred on a character not quite at the hub of the action - an observer, one who can reflect and speculate. And isn't that all of us as our everyday lives infringe on the events of the world - infringe rather than impact?

As in many Philip Dick novels there are logical challenges which may compromise the story for people who are unable/unwilling to accept a basic premise of the novel. In this case it is the power of a drug to actually move people temporarily in time - forwards or backwards - or across parallel worlds. Not make it appear that they move, but actually move them. The descriptions of characters in the influence of the drug are so fascinating - for me anyway - that the logical discontinuities disappeared into the far recesses of my mind. And now I realise that there are many logical problems for me in the REAL world that I have trundled away in the back of my mind so that I can get on with life.

Philip Dick's graphic and extending speculations on the natureof reality certainly push hard into my reality and how I understand it. And here's a quote: '..... you've only got one tiny life and that lies ahead of you, not sideways or back.'

This novel has been published in 1966 and belongs to the best books of Philip K. Dick. The themes treated in NOW WAIT FOR LAST YEAR are not a surprise for those of us who have read the precedent books of the american writer. But, in this book, Philip K. Dick succeeds perfectly in the alchemy of the plot.

An alien invasion that is never happening, a commander in chief of the Earth population who could be a simulacra, a dangerous drug that is altering time and reality, an average character who has to act as an hero in order to save the humanity : all these themes have already been treated by Philip K. Dick. But not with so much empathy - a fundamental word in PKD vocabulary - in the description of the feelings of his characters.

In my opinion, the relation between Eric and Katharine Sweetscent, the doctor and his drug-addicted wife, marks a turning point in the evolution of Dick's literary skills. Hate, Love, Regrets and Empathy hadn't been until then so masterfully painted under Dick's pen.

NOW WAIT FOR LAST YEAR is one of PKD's books that could let you enter the unique imaginary world of this american writer. Don't hesitate to open the door.

A book for your library.

While Philip K. Dick never fails to impress me with his brilliance, the publisher succeed in writing a sketchy edition of these short stories. Every story has its own thought behind it - a deeper meaning. My favorite stories were "Some Kinds of Life", "We Can Remember It For You Wholesale", and "Adjustment Team" which each story brings a whole new concept that has been exploited in recent media. However, while entranced in these short bursts of envigorating stories, one can become distracted with the large amount of typos in this edition. The abscence of characters and grammatical errors often caused me to stop reading smoothly and re-read the sentence. Ultimately, I was disgusted by this bad representation of such a masterpiece.

I would recommend people to buy this book who are interested in Dick's works, but do not have the time to immerse themselves in a full-fledged novel. These stories take approximately twenty minutes each and are all amusing. A wonderful read, but the publisher might want to proofread the writing.

It is a credit to Philip K. Dick's talent that even in his early days - at a time when he was cranking out stories just to keep food on the table - that he was able to write so much fiction that is not only good, but great.

In this second volume of a five book set that includes essentially all his short works, we get to read more of his earliest tales and find there is little to disappoint here. The title piece is the short story which was adapted into the movie Total Recall. I like the movie well enough, but outside the premise, there is little that is really similar to the original story, which has much more of an emphasis on the comic than on action.

In fact, the majority of these stories have a comic touch. Since these are tales of dark futures - most involve Earth's that are either environmentally wrecked or repressive dictatorships - the humor prevents things from getting too depressing.

You don't have to be a Dick fan to enjoy these stories, nor even much of a science fiction fan (though it helps); this is just a fantastic collection of short stories that are both fun and thought-provoking. What more could you want?

I started reading PKD's work 6 years ago and I had a... copy of this book. Looking back, I was very glad I picked this superb volume to begin with. The amount of entertainment and thought-provoking ideas I got out of the ...book made me buy every book (new or old) I could find of PKD.

Now I just hope I have the time to read all of them...at least once.

Don't miss any of PKD's books, especially the short stories.