It's January 2021 and Rick Deckard is a bounty hunter for the San Francisco
Police Department. He hunts down and "retires" rogue androids (andys).
Thanks to technology from companies like the Rosen Association, it's getting
increasingly hard to tell the androids from the humans, but there is an
empathy test that Deckard can administer; androids don't feel empathy for
humans or for each other. Meanwhile, due to the devastation wreaked
by nuclear fallout from World War Terminus, animal life is nearly sacred
and pets are status symbols. Deckard and his wife have an electric
sheep just to try and keep up with the Joneses. Also, the fallout
is starting to impact the genetics and fertility of humans, so the government
is advocating emigration to Mars, running a Public Service Ad that warns:
"Emigrate or degenerate! The choice is yours!" Amidst
all of this, a new religion has arisen called Mercerism. It's founder,
Wilber Mercer, is an empath who is taking all of mankind's suffering upon
his own shoulders. Adherents transmit their pain to him through Mercer
Boxes and receive inner peace in return. Now Deckard has been given
the assignment of retiring a gang of 8 andys and, to his own horror, he
finds that he is starting to develop feelings of empathy for these humanoids
while Mercer is telling him that it's wrong to kill the androids, but that
he has to go ahead and do it anyway.
This is my favorite of Philip K. Dick's novels. It deals imaginatively
with the big themes that are central to speculative fiction, especially
what is it that makes us human. And, unlike some of his other books,
he maintains the momentum of the basic story line throughout and keeps
everything reasonably coherent.
(Reviewed:21-Dec-99)
Grade: (B+)
Websites:
Phillip Dick Links:
-The CriticalWave: an ongoing bibliographical list of Philip K. Dick's work.
The Second Coming of Philip K. Dick: The inside-out story of how a hyper-paranoid, pulp-fiction hack conquered the movie world 20 years after his death. (Frank Rose, December 2003, Wired)
-REVIEW: of The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch by Philip K Dick (Michael Moorcock, The Guardian)
Book-related and General Links:
-ENCYCLOPAEDIA
BRITANNICA: "philip k. dick"
-philipkdick.com
-Shifting
Worlds of Philip K. Dick
-The
Philip Kindred Dick WWW FAQ
-Philip
K. Dick, 1928-1982 (includes cover art)
-Philip
K Dick: A Tribute to A Master of Science Fiction
-Philip
K. Dick (1928-1982)
-Philip
K. Dick reading List (SF Site)
-Laura's
Addiction : Phillip K. Dick from A to Z
-NEWSGROUP:
altfanphilipdick
-Paranormal
Experiences of Philip K. Dick
-LINKS:
Dick, Philip K. (Lycos)
-ESSAY
: Marxist Literary Critics Are Following Me! : How Philip K. Dick betrayed
his academic admirers to the FBI. (Jeet Heer, Lingua Franca)
-ESSAY
: Through a Lens Darkly : Josh Saunders on Philip K. Dick, last of the
early Christians (FEED)
-ESSAY:
The Electric Dreams of Philip K. Dick (Richard Bernstein, NY Times
Book Review)
-ESSAY:
Dick's Dicks: The Future of Law Enforcement According to Philip K. Dick
(Tim Kenyon, The Council for the Literature of the Fantastic based
at the Department of English of the University of Rhode Island)
-ESSAYS:
( A Tribute to A Master of Science Fiction)
-ESSAY:
Joyce in Philip K. Dick (The Modern World)
-REVIEW:
of Do Androids Dream... (Mystery Guide)
-ESSAY
: Dickian Time in The Man in the High Castle
-ESSAY
: Meaning in the Man in the High Castle
-PLOTLINES
in The Man in the High Castle
-ESSAY
: The Metacolonization of Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle:
Mimicry, Parasitism, and Americanism in the P.S.A. (Cassie Carter,
Science-Fiction Studies 22.67, Nov. 1995)
-ESSAY
: Reality, Authenticity, Metafiction and The Man in the High Castle.
(Ian Krykorka)
-REVIEW
: of Man in the High Castle by Philip K. Dick ( Mark Wilson , scifi.com)
-SHORT
REVIEW: MARY AND THE GIANT. By Philip K. Dick (Nancy Forbes, NY Times
Book Review)
-SHORT
REVIEW: PUTTERING ABOUT IN A SMALL LAND. By Philip K. Dick (Barbara
Tritel, NY Times Book Review)
-BOOK
LIST: Great Science Fiction: recommended Reading (Steve Schmidt)
FILMS :
-FILMOGRAPHY
: Philip K. Dick (Imdb)
-INFO
: Blade Runner (1982) (Imdb)
-BUY
IT : Blade Runner (1982) DVD (Amazon.com)
-Blade
Runner Kitchener / Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
-REVIEW
: of Blade Runner (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun Times)
-REVIEW
: of Blade Runner (Desson Howe, Washington Post)
-REVIEW
: of Blade Runner (Rita Kempley, Washington Post)
-REVIEW
: of Blade Runner (Film Written Magazine)
-BUY
IT: Total Recall (1990) DVD (amazon.com)
-BUY
IT: Total Recall (1990) VHS (amazon.com)
-INFO
: Total Recall (1990) (imdb)
-REVIEW:
of Total Recall (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times)
-REVIEW:
of Total Recall (James Berardinelli's ReelViews)
-REVIEW:
of Total Recall (Desson Howe, Washington Post)
-REVIEW:
of Total Recall (Rita Kempley, Washington Post)
-REVIEW:
of Total Recall (John Hartl, Film.com)
GENERAL:
-ESSAY:
Beyond the lurid book covers : In defense of science fiction (John
Clute, CNN/Salon)
-ESSAY
: Is Cyberpunk Still Breathing (ANDREW LEONARD, Salon)
Comments:
Orrin welcomes reader comments on his reviews.
Add yours here.
