His religions, psychoses, divorces, and drug use aside, Philip K. Dick changed the face of American science fiction with his mind-bending writing. There may be readers who have only heard of him as the mind behind Blade Runner (based on his novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?). But even casual PKD fans should take a look at these 24 short stories, among them, "Second Variety," from which the movie Screamers was made, and "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale," basis of the Schwarzenegger film Total Recall. Other standouts include "The Turning Wheel," "The Last of the Masters," "Tony and the Beetles," and "The Minority Report." Readers will recognize PKD's trademark themes: capitalism and the American dream run amok, a disquieting loss of ability to distinguish friends from enemies, and humans versus machines.
Since Philip K. Dick's heyday, and thanks in large part to his influence, the contemporary science fiction short story has evolved into a form more self-reflective and psychologically complex. This is a wonderful development, to be sure. But don't regard the older stories in this collection as dated. Instead, enjoy the peppery punch: PKD's stories provide plenty of plot twists and surprise endings. --Bonnie Bouman
The Philip K. Dick Reader FROM THE PUBLISHER
"Philip K. Dick was a master of science fiction, but he was also a writer whose work transcended genre to examine the nature of reality and what it means to be human. A writer of great complexity and subtle humor, his work belongs on the shelf of great twentieth-century literature, next to Kafka and Vonnegut. Collected here are twenty-one of Dick's most dazzling and resonant stories, which span his entire career and show a world-class writer working at the peak of his powers." In "The Davis of Perky Pat," people spend their time playing with dolls who manage to live an idyllic life no longer available to the Earth's real inhabitants. "Adjustment Team" looks at the fate of a man who by mistake has stepped out of his own time. In "Autofac," one community must battle benign machines to take back control of their lives. And in "I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon," we follow the story of one man whose very reality may be nothing more than a nightmare. The collection also includes such classic stories as "The Minority Report," the basis for the Steven Spielberg movie, and "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale," the basis for the film Total Recall. Selected Stories of Philip K. Dick is a magnificent distillation of one of American literature's most searching imaginations.
FROM THE CRITICS
Publishers Weekly
Selected Stories of Philip K. Dick, with an introduction by Jonathan Lethem, should help persuade mainstream readers that the late SF author was no "mere" genre writer. Fans of the Spielberg film Minority Report will find Dick's original, "The Minority Report," along with 20 other masterful tales.
Kirkus Reviews
Twenty-one stories culled from Dick's (1928ﾽ82) considerable output; all have appeared in collections before, if only in the five-volume Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick (1986). Although the basis for the current selection isn't clear, the timing coincides with the release of yet another movie based on his work. Both "Beyond Lies the Wub," Dick's first published story, and "Roog," his first sale, appear. Most of the stories reflect Dick's dearest obsessions, "What is real?" or "What is human?," sometimes both at once. For Dick, reality might be adjusted at any moment: by the government, drugs, psychiatrists, aliens, or god. Angels could be vampires. Memories are at best unreliable, more likely false, or lost altogether. Machines, once activated, canﾽt be shut off, and overthrow humanity. Changelings remain unaware of their real identity: robots assume they're human; an assassin knows nothing of the bomb he carries. Four tales here have been made into movies, if not altogether recognizably: "Second Variety" became Screamers; "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale" developed, via Piers Anthony, into Arnold Schwarzenegger's Total Recall; "Imposter," spelled correctly, is Impostor; and the recent adaptation of "The Minority Report" stars Tom Cruise. Was Dick then a prophet, clairvoyantly writing outlines for future movie moguls? No. But it's curious how aptly today's world reflects the concepts that tormented and fascinated the author: paranoia, shifting realities, pulp culture, and machines. These are not, for the most part, outstanding stories, but the worlds of this fevered imagination have become our luridly inescapable reality.
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