From his perch in the mid-20th century, Philip K. Dick (1928-82) was a great predictor of how the 21st century would be – because he understood humans and their societal structures don’t fundamentally change. The future would look the same as the Fifties, only with higher technology — obviously, flying cars and completely human-like robots. Landlines and print newspapers would of course remain the primary means of communication.
OK, so PKD wasn’t right about everything, but he was right about the things that mattered. To him, that was the way governments try to control humans, hurting them in order to preserve their power for another day. Also, it was the meaning of life – via a sort-of-Christian religion that perhaps he was the chosen conduit for. (Or perhaps he was crazy; PKD was sane enough to entertain that possibility.)
Further still, daily life mattered to him. Like any sane person in an insane world, he adapted with humor. Flying cars that talk back, conapt doors that won’t open till you put money in the slot, Ganymedean slime mold neighbors who look out for you in a way your human neighbors don’t. Simply put, the guy’s imagination always fired on all cylinders – from the Fifties when he was learning about SF by imitation to the Eighties when he had become a polished wordsmith.
Soon after his too-young death, PKD became appreciated for his untamed ideas that were both imaginative and prophetic, and Dick started to be mentioned alongside Clarke, Asimov and Heinlein when fans picked their sci-fi Mount Rushmores. As the world gets worse, PKD will only become more loved as a visionary of the actual future – and as an entertaining way to escape that actuality.
While I don’t rate a single novel as “not worth reading,” some books are better than others. So here is my ranking of all 35 of PKD’s science fiction novels written for adults (thus leaving out the one children’s book, the nine non-SF novels and the five short-story volumes), from worst to first. Click on each title for a full review.
35. “The Cosmic Puppets” (written in 1953, published in 1957)
PKD’s worst sci-fi novel is actually pretty decent for the first half. Ted returns to his hometown of Millgate, Virginia, to find it has changed. By thinking really hard about it – helped by an old man who likewise remembers the previous Millgate – he’s able to temporarily change it back. There are paths to take here about how “You can’t go home again” and how reality is fungible. But then PKD shifts gears and gets obsessed with Good versus Evil, as two Old Testament-esque superbeings battle it out in overblown and uninteresting fashion. Strangely, PKD isn’t doing this to make fun of religion; he plays it straight.
34. “The Unteleported Man” (1964, 1966) / “Lies, Inc.” (1984)
The 107-page “Unteleported Man” is the superior version, but curious readers who want to buy only one copy can read “Lies, Inc.” minus chapters 9-14 to get that original version. (The afterword to the Vintage edition has more details about the precise start and end of the new material.) Then they can go back and read the drug-trip “bonus material,” understanding that it creates a plot hole wherein ben Applebaum switches sides without explanation. Whew. Die-hard fans might also appreciate this book (either version) as a companion piece to “Man in the High Castle.” Dick suggests that the portal to Whale’s Mouth – a supposed solution to overpopulation – is actually The Final Solution. This novel is more complex than that, though – indeed, its over-complexity is its flaw – and PKD ultimately makes a smart (and somewhat daring at the time) distinction between Nazis and decent Germans who did not support Nazi depredations.
33. “Vulcan’s Hammer” (1953, 1960)
This is PKD’s first-written sci-fi novel, and it shows in its uncharacteristic lack of humor. It’s tempting to say he’s imitating SF as he works toward finding his own voice (particularly when he tries for a grand action finale), but the topic itself is quite prescient of future genre classics and real-world tech. “Vulcan’s Hammer” reads today like a ripoff of “The Terminator” – it’s even set in 2029 – but of course it predates that film by 24 years. PKD observes how governments are about power, not about the people, and their main tools are flying killer drones – parallels to war weapons and spy devices in the 21st century. Nonetheless, he sympathizes with the bureaucrat lead character, a quirk that would pop up in many future works.
32. “Solar Lottery” (1954, 1955)
PKD’s first-published SF novel finds him jotting down wild ideas more so than writing a coherent plot. He invents a totalitarian government that classifies people and doesn’t use money, a precursor to 21st century young-adult series like “The Hunger Games” and “Divergent.” It might be fun to follow the political machinations except that the rules of the game aren’t clearly explained. “Solar Lottery” has wacky ideas such as throwing off precog trackers by using a simulacrum controlled by one of 24 people in randomized fashion. However, this doesn’t account for the fact that traditional tracking would still work. An unconnected side thread intriguingly chronicles the search for a 10th planet, but it goes nowhere.
31. “Dr. Futurity” (1953, 1960)
Not playing it as safe as his more conventional efforts to establish himself as a sci-fi writer, PKD daringly digs into racial purity and the notion of illness as something that doctors are morally wrong to cure. He delivers one great absurd moment: The titular protagonist travels to a key event in the past and finds five time-ships parked there. The attempts to change the timestream never work, since everything snaps back into place like a rubber band. As such, this novel could be called “Dr. Futility.” It doesn’t make sense why people would keep attempting something proven not to work. But PKD’s dip into alternate history – imagining a New World landing on the West Coast – is an interesting precursor to “Man in the High Castle.”
30. “The Crack in Space” (1963, 1966)
This is the weakest of PKD’s Sixties hodgepodge novels – where he recycles and expands ideas from short stories and (at the time) unpublished works. It’s politically focused, but in a dry fashion rather than the wonderful satire of “The Simulacra.” Many of his political predictions are broadly on point – the continuation of racism, immigration and employment fears, and perpetual distrust among nations – as he invents a new-frontier Earth accessible by a portal. Some aspects are uncomfortably out of time, including the Sixties-style racism by which the 2080 presidential candidate is disliked because he’s a “Negro.” And it’s apparent that when staunch pro-lifer PKD writes about abortion, he is unable to bring any levity or nuance, the way he does with other political issues.
29. “Dr. Bloodmoney, or How We Got Along After the Bomb” (1963, 1965)
PKD lived his life petrified that nuclear war could break out at any moment, so perhaps this novel was cathartic as he flat-out chronicles the falling of the bombs and the immediate aftermath in Marin County. The narrative lacks intense stakes since every human being has essentially already lost. So we’re left with the fallout and self-incriminations, notably by the title character who got rich from warfare and now (like everyone else) has nothing. Some fun is found in the form of the human and animal mutants. We meet a girl with a parasite of a brother poking out of her abdomen, a tiny man with useless limbs but super brain powers, and – most humorously – a dog who can talk if he strains hard enough.
28. “A Maze of Death” (1968, 1970)
Ultimately too trippy and undercooked, “Maze” does feature strong concepts. Prayers become reality, a decrepit colony planet might be Earth itself (a la “Planet of the Apes,” released around the time of this book’s writing), and – calling to mind “The Thing” – all of the colonists are paranoid about everyone else amid a mysterious murder spree. This book could function as a prequel to “Clans of the Alphane Moon,” except here Dick contends that people with mental problems can’t live together in peace. But it should be noted that in “Clans,” the patients are left to their own devices; in “Maze,” they are secretly manipulated within a grand, twisted experiment. I wonder if PKD himself found his finished novel too wild to comprehend, as a rare prolog advises readers that the narrators should not be trusted.
27. “The Ganymede Takeover” (1965, 1967), with Ray Nelson
This is another thematic companion piece to “Man in the High Castle,” with Nelson (also famous for writing the short story that was adapted by John Carpenter into “They Live”) likely polishing the sci-fi and tech details. Ganymedean worm creatures have conquered Earth. Some humans thirst for the happy collectivism endemic to the Ganymedeans’ nature, some go with the flow (“same sh**, different leaders,” so to speak) and others rebel, not wanting to see humanity’s propensity for individualism totally lost. The themes are well-taken, but in chronicling the rebel faction, the book is even more regressive than “Crack in Space.” The future black people deal with issues and prejudices more in line with the fight against slavery from the 19th century.
26. “The Zap Gun” (1964, 1967)
The opposite of most mid-range PKD books, “Zap Gun” starts off hard to read but gets better as it goes along. It’s ultimately an uncompromising satire of the warfare state. Things have progressed (or regressed) to a situation where the war departments of the two superpowers focus on maintaining a perpetual cold war so money will keep flowing from the taxpayers to their coffers. Initially, PKD uses so many acronyms and new words that “Zap Gun” is hard to vibe with. But it rewards patient readers as we get to know a trio of ridiculous characters – Febbs, a common man who embraces his (now toothless) Constitutional rights; Lars, a sad sack unfulfilled by his job as a designer of purposely ineffective weapons; and Surley, a revolutionary who is too smart to actually lead a successful coup.
25. “Galactic Pot-Healer” (1968, 1969)
PKD explores two ideas that don’t quite seamlessly blend together. In the best part, he shows Joe Fernwright’s miserable life in Communist Cleveland, a grind through petty laws, out-of-control inflation and desperate attempts to stay sane (a popular guessing game essentially involves running phrases through Google Translate multiple times). In the not-as-great part, Joe and others are invited to join the godlike underwater Glimmung on Plowman’s Planet. Their reward for helping the Glimmung raise a cathedral is endless contentment, but to Joe this resembles the false promises of Communism. PKD has written more accessible religious quests than “Pot-Healer,” but readers particularly well-versed in Biblical details tend to rank this novel higher than I do.
24. “Deus Irae” (1964, 1976), with Roger Zelazny
Perhaps thanks to Zelazny, this is the most narratively focused of Dick’s novels about a man’s search for fulfillment through religion. Calling to mind “A Canticle for Leibowitz,” “Alice in Wonderland” and the second “Planet of the Apes” film, “Deus Irae” follows Tibor – who has no working limbs and uses a motorized cart — on a brutal journey across the desert West. He aims to paint a portrait of the leader of the dominant new religion, which worships the bomb that created this wasteland world, a jab at how the winners always have a following. Despite dark satire like that, and one funny passage about a man sitting in a waiting room of a malfunctioning autofac, “Deus Irae” is on the grim side. But it’s quite readable, and more focused than the similarly themed “Dr. Bloodmoney.”
23. “The World Jones Made” (1954, 1956)
“Jones” is a little overstuffed and underwhelming in each thread. For instance, PKD invents a future government where lying is illegal, but he doesn’t explore the theme to its extremes like, say, “The Invention of Lying.” Still, the satire is on point as he shows the absurdity of modern laws and social mores via simple replacements – for example, heroin is legal and pornography is mainstream, whereas alcohol and lying are outlawed. The title character functions like a non-evil proto-Palmer Eldritch, exhausted by his one-year-at-a-time precog ability. PKD’s exploration of Venus is as Arthur C. Clarkean as he’ll get. It’s an interesting window into how SF writers dreamed about our sister planet before scientists discovered its uninhabitable nature.
22. “The Game-Players of Titan” (1963)
This uneven novel is 75 percent great, but the final 25 percent is a confusing mess about shapeshifting aliens. PKD starts with a compelling murder mystery: Pete wakes up with amnesia, supposedly having killed his friend after a game of Bluff – the way in which property is exchanged in this low-populated future of plentiful resources. Then he loses interest in the mystery. “Game-Players” shines in its humorous details, including a flying car with faulty personality wiring who tells its driver “Up yours” when given instructions. Because Pete needs to contact his friends while flying away, this novel particularly illustrates the failure of PKD (and his SF-writing contemporaries) to predict cellphones. Whether that’s an inexcusable flaw or another amusing thing about this semi-utopian future is up to the reader.
21. “The Divine Invasion” (1980, 1981)
Dick breaks down the Bible and reassembles it via characters who are precise stand-ins for the cast of the Old Testament. If I as a layperson had thought “Deus Irae” was his most religious novel, or if Biblical experts had thought it’s “Galactic Pot-Healer,” now we all stand corrected. “The Divine Invasion” is, without a paragraph of relief, entirely the story of godlike beings coming to Earth and being received by prophets. It should theoretically be unappealing to me as an atheist, but I enjoy it a lot because it’s well-written. Ironically, in the post “pink laser beam of truth” period of his life when Dick worried he might be insane, his plotting and characterizations gained the precision of a veteran wordsmith.
20. “Eye in the Sky” (1955, 1957)
This early gem is a crisp examination of PKD’s favorite theme – the subjective nature of reality – as various folks fall into a Bevatron and experience each others’ desired versions of reality. PKD switches from a sober portrayal an of Old Testament clash in “Cosmic Puppets” to making fun of religious fundamentalists: A man successfully prays for everything he needs. It loses some punch because the editors switch the religion from Christianity to an inaccurate portrayal of another religion, but the point is still taken. Another thread makes fun of a prudish woman and another finds PKD at his most Stephen King-ish. Behind these side trips, the broader narrative plays out – showing PKD’s improving grasp of plot structure – and he makes a sharp point about how binary political systems fear individualists much more than their rival party.
19. “VALIS” (1978, 1981)
I suspect the debate between whether you prefer “Radio Free Albemuth” or “VALIS” – two takes on the premise of an intergalactic intelligence warning the protagonist about impending doom – will heat up with time. For now I’m in the minority in preferring “RFA,” the cleaner of the two, but I appreciate “VALIS” as a meta companion piece. Within this novel the characters watch the movie “Valis,” which contains the narrative of “RFA.” Among the characters are both Philip K. Dick and Horselover Fat (the German translation of PKD’s name). The author splits himself into two people as a way to examine his sanity. The fact that he can do this in a cogent fashion suggests that he is sane – albeit a sane man who thinks he might’ve stumbled upon the meaning of the universe.
18. “We Can Build You” (1962, 1972)
Written before “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” but published after, this could be a prequel set in the same timeline. PKD includes psycho-analysis tests, mood organs, and of course androids – in this case of real-world historical figures Abraham Lincoln and Edward M. Stanton. Mom-and-pop business types build the simulacra, although a large corporation aims to buy them out. Interestingly, PKD actually sympathizes with the androids here (he’d be more wary of them in “DADOES”), although he doesn’t dig deeply into that theme. Instead, he gets distracted by the misguided not-quite-love story between humans Rosen and Pris, who both have mental health issues. The overcrowding of the mental health clinic is a smart prediction of the future, balancing out the absurd image of a perfectly lifelike Lincoln being hidden in the backseat of a car, wrapped in print newspapers.
17. “Counter-Clock World” (1965, 1967)
This is one of Dick’s most ambitious and hilarious pieces of world-building, as he takes the scientific notion of the expansion of time and space and asks what would happen if those things instead contracted. Hilariously, everyday processes happen in reverse, dead people revive and age back to childhood, and language adjusts – “goodbye” is now the proper greeting. Most thematically compelling, the Library is the most powerful political entity, existing for the sake of eradicating the past, “1984” style. “CCW’s” geopolitical split along black-white race lines shows that the Civil Rights Movement was very much on PKD’s mind, and it doesn’t smoothly translate to the future. But then again, this book is about regression, so even that aspect fits.
16. “The Man Who Japed” (1955, 1956)
This is PKD’s more nuanced answer to the bluntness of George Orwell’s “1984,” published eight years earlier. He shows a moralistically totalitarian future that’s self-imposed at the lowest level of government (the conapt). There’s no need for force, because people fall in line when bombarded by propaganda – which is the job of Purcell, one of the author’s Joe Schmoes who works for the government. In “1984,” people who don’t fall in line are killed, but in “Japed,” they are shipped off to Other World – a paradise for anarchists. Purcell isn’t free of attachments – those he cares for are stuck on Earth – so he doesn’t kick back and enjoy the utopia he’s gifted with. I found this to be a logic hole at first, but the more I think about it, I realize PKD creates a tidy parallel to governments who can’t leave people alone: an individual who can’t enjoy himself if other people are suffering.
15. “Now Wait for Last Year” (1963, 1966)
This is a good novel for learning about PKD’s psychological problems if we take protagonist Eric Sweetscent as a stand-in for the author. Eric is highly successful in his field – implanting artiforgs (artificial organs) – but he hates his own guts, partially because his wife bombards him with criticisms. This is likely a parallel to PKD himself, who was starting to gain accolades and sales, but who was easily influenced by other people’s views, and who had a shallow view of love. Eric is most in love with his wife when she’s comatose and he can dwell on her positive traits. I like how “Last Year’s” time travel has the real consequence of brain damage for people who overuse it. PKD keeps the political-gamesmanship rules and stakes cogent, but above all, the novel’s value is in Dick’s self-analysis.
14. “The Penultimate Truth” (1964)
In “The World Jones Made,” PKD toys with the notion of lying being outlawed. In “Penultimate Truth” he takes the opposite – and more realistic – tack, creating a world where everything runs on lies that are taken as truth. People are content to be underground slaves because the government has told them the surface is uninhabitable. This is the author’s most stark appreciation piece for a free media because it shows how bad things can get when the government controls the flow of information. Though overwritten and dependent on the recycling of several short stories, this turns out to be a strong thematic piece. The ending is dramatically underwhelming yet chilling: The big lie is found out, so the government simply rewrites the “truth” again, and it’s again accepted.
13. “The Simulacra” (1963, 1964)
PKD mashes together several short stories and parts of his unpublished (at the time) non-SF novels into an absurd hodgepodge. Perhaps by dumb luck, “The Simulacra” ends up being a hilarious satire of a future where the government tries to control everything. It has reached a point where even those who have successfully grabbed power – like the first lady who is actually an actress, and whose “husband” the president is actually a robot – are miserable. In another case, a psychiatrist has built up a thriving practice (the majority of the populace is mentally ill) but then the government outlaws his profession, as it has been bought off by drug manufacturers. I might rank this book higher if it was more focused, but on the other hand, the sheer volume of absurdities is what makes it so good.
12. “Clans of the Alphane Moon” (1964)
This novel is disliked by some for being inaccurate or outdated about the specifics of psychological conditions, but I think the idea of a colony split into clans based on their mental-health problems is entertaining enough to make up for it. The book’s ultimate point is that “In an insane universe, being crazy is the sane approach.” Ironically, PKD telegraphs this theme and presents it in a sober matter; this isn’t among his craziest novels. In fact, main character Chuck – the PKD stand-in who contemplates suicide (he’s talked out of it by his Ganymedean slime mold neighbor) and loathes his ex-wife — tests out as sane when he’s finally psycho-analyzed. Keeping “Clans” from a higher ranking is that the goals of the three rival political entities battling over Alpha III M2 are unclear. But as mental health becomes more of an open topic in society, this novel will perhaps gain stature.
11. “Martian Time-Slip” (1962, 1964)
“Time-Slip” benefits from a close read in order to appreciate how PKD’s wild ideas coalesce into effective world-building – in this case a new “Old West” on the Red Planet. It’s unfortunate that PKD doesn’t use the terms “schizophrenia” and “autism” precisely right – instead imagining that those traits in Manfred allow him to peek into the future. But the author does metaphorically tap into how neurodivergents see the world differently from neurotypicals. And he includes a spot-on segment about Manfred’s discomfort with public displays of affection, plus a clever solution to social anxiety – the neurodivergent can attend functions with a neurotypical who serves as a sort of translator. This is impressive considering that the very notion of NDs was fairly new when PKD was writing this.
10. “The Transmigration of Timothy Archer” (1981, 1982)
PKD didn’t know this would be the last novel he’d write, but – as if there was divine intervention – it reads like a final statement of contentment about his spiritual quest for the meaning of life that had transpired in “VALIS” and “The Divine Invasion.” It’s also a nostalgia piece about the midcentury from the perspective of the Eighties, built around radio stations playing Beatles tunes in the wake of John Lennon’s assassination. Meanwhile, there’s a touch of the mystery and grandeur of religious movies such as “The Exorcist,” as Archer travels to the Middle East in search of additional books of the Bible that could redefine the whole Christian story. Giving the novel an appealing wistfulness is that the examination of Archer’s sanity comes through the observant lens of thoroughly sane narrator Angel. She’s the only cover-to-cover female narrator in the career of PKD, who had many infamously distrustful relationships with women.
9. “Ubik” (1966, 1969)
“Ubik” is stuffed with PKD’s favorite notions, as sad sack protagonist Joe Chip – surrounded by allies with a variety of mind powers that call to mind the X-Men – must figure out whether a pivotal incident on the moon has left him in the “real” reality or the “alternate” reality. This percolating mystery puts “Ubik” a cut above PKD’s other idea-packed novels. The author balances humor (in a future where everything is monetized, Joe is too poor to pay the fee to open his conapt door) with bittersweetness about the end of life (and perhaps the end of one reality). Some deceased people can temporarily live “half-lives” in cold-pac. This allows loved ones to sparingly talk to them before their time totally expires. After an ending that readers are still deciphering, we’re left to consider that Ubik’s top-of-the-line breakfast cereal and deodorant have more staying power than civilization itself.
8. “Our Friends from Frolix 8” (1969, 1970)
Less lauded than “A Scanner Darkly” and “Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said,” this is the first published of Dick’s three brilliant police-state parables of the Seventies. Nick Appleton lives in the harshest PKD reality since “Man in the High Castle,” as all of his actions are spied on. This would be the case anyway, but it’s an especially miserable experience because the government has singled him out as a case study. Also hurting Nick’s chance at happiness: He happens to be able to think for himself and wish he lived in a better world. Along with the heady exploration of the spy state and the hopeful prospect of an encounter with a powerful benevolent alien, “Frolix” is slightly autobiographical. Nick has lost interest in his wife Kleo (the name of one of Dick’s wives) and become obsessed with a young woman who almost certainly will be even worse for him.
7. “Time Out of Joint” (1958, 1959)
This is PKD’s earliest masterpiece, and a key insight into his mind. As much as he distrusted certain aspects of the time he lived in, he suspected things would get worse. As such, he’s able to pull off something rare: a nostalgic novel about 1958, written in 1958. A well-crafted mystery about the true nature of newspaper puzzle expert Ragle Gumm’s world percolates in the background. Then it’s capped with revelation that presages “The Truman Show” and “The Village.” That conclusive twist and the SF bent to PKD’s future fears – the pointless, destructive war is on the moon rather than Earth – are the book’s talking points. But what clinches its greatness is PKD’s newfound ability to follow a sympathetic character on a novel-length journey.
6. “The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch” (1964, 1965)
PKD tiptoed into exploring the specific traits of a demigod in “The World Jones Made.” Here he goes all-in, as humanity’s future depends on the proclivities of the titular reality-manipulating, and perhaps nonhuman, corporate magnate who pushes the mind-altering drug Chew-Z. PKD crafts a foreboding mood by presenting a future Earth with a cli-fi scenario where it’s 170 degrees in New York and the world’s best vacation beaches are in Antarctica. The novel is a “Matrix” precursor, too, as most people are oblivious to their horrible surroundings; they are too busy drug-tripping into the alternate reality of the interactive board game Perky Pat. The scary thing is that we can’t blame them.
5. “Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said” (1970, 1974)
In the second of the thematic police-state trilogy (between “Frolix” and “A Scanner Darkly”), Dick critiques the codifying of morality (and even immorality, as the police adjust some laws to suit their immoral leanings). What makes “Flow My Tears” great, though, is that we get to know celebrity-turned-everyman (as per his inadvertent switch to a different reality) Jason Taverner and a police enforcer with a buried nugget of decency, Felix Buckman. Amid the chase-and-pursuit narrative are observations about how horrible government actions can be normalized in the wake of a tragic event (the Second World War in the book, 9/11 to a modern reader). The college-to-labor-camp pipeline stands as prophetic in this era of crushing student-loan debt. I suspect PKD was emotionally exhausted when he got to the end, as he grants relief to Buckman and Taverner alike. Both author and readers deserved a happy ending by that point.
4. “Radio Free Albemuth” (1976, 1985)
An unofficial fourth book of the “VALIS” trilogy, “RFA” is PKD’s first attempt at what became “VALIS,” featuring the notion that an intergalactic intelligence is warning the protagonist that the president is the personification of pure evil. PKD had gotten deeply into religion by this point in his life, but not a specific denomination; in a way, he was creating his own religion, although not as cynically as L. Ron Hubbard. You might say “RFA” contains the Book of Phil (wherein Dick writes in the first person) and the Book of Nicholas (wherein Phil’s friend makes observations about him). This is a think-piece more than a propulsive work of plotting, which is why it was initially rejected for publication. But “RFA” is so on point about the downward-spiral inertia of political forces that it’s rightly gaining appreciation as a classic rather than a curiosity.
3. “The Man in the High Castle” (1961, 1962)
PKD’s weaker novels up to this point had multiple ideas that didn’t smoothly interweave; his stronger ones were the narratively straightforward “Eye in the Sky” and “Time Out of Joint.” Here, he delivers his first novel that’s both complex and connected. It has to be read closely (and this book should not be suggested as a person’s introduction to PKD), as the author switches between many points of view, people speak in a new form of Japanese-influenced English, and we need an eagle eye to discern which seemingly trivial moments are important. Through it all, we and the protagonists feel something’s not right about this world where the Nazis and Japanese co-rule the United States. The question of how to escape into the “true” reality (the one we readers live in) isn’t merely a mystery for Juliana Frink and other POV characters, but also a profound quest.
2. “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” (1966, 1968)
This is one of PKD’s most poignant novels, as bounty hunter Rick Deckard navigates a near future that’s literally (furniture collapses in the abandoned conapts) and figuratively (institutions gradually give up on controlling their subjects) devolving into “kipple.” Although it’s the opposite of its film version (“Blade Runner”) in that Dick isn’t as sympathetic toward the androids, the tragedy of the fact that humans are hunting down their lookalikes is very much present. Deckard does it because he must make money, which he needs to buy a real animal – the ultimate status symbol. Even more so than other PKD protagonists, Deckard can’t think for himself; he’s a product of the system. Also featuring insight into the control apparatus of a duopoly, “DADOES” is PKD’s most focused and lyrical piece of dystopian world-building. It’s no surprise it led to “Blade Runner,” which has itself led to another film, plus TV, books and comics.
1. “A Scanner Darkly” (1973, 1977)
I first found love for “A Scanner Darkly” and PKD in general through the absurd notion that drug warrior Bob Arctor is investigating himself, but not realizing it. It’s hard to explain how PKD makes this scenario plausible, but he does indeed in this masterpiece that critiques both the Drug War and drug experimentation. Even as the novel illustrates how government policy perpetuates drug culture – to the point where warriors and dealers are the two primary classes of people, with a lot of muddled crossover – it’s deeply personal. Arctor’s brain damage is gut-wrenching, and his friends don’t fare much better. This melancholy novel ends with a devastating author’s note (something Dick rarely used) where he reveals the characters are based on his friends who were either brain-damaged or killed by drugs. Intimately personal yet deeply insightful about the mechanics of the Drug War, and spiced with the sci-fi of Arctor’s Scramble Suit, there’s no muddling around this point: “A Scanner Darkly” is PKD’s crowning achievement.
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