"...suicide is painlessIt brings on many changesand I can take or leave it if I please.I try to find a way to makeall our little joys relatewithout that ever-present hatebut now I know that it's too late..." that song could have been written for the Dick that wrote this book, and for its hero. Eric Sweetscent is regularly, matter-of-factly suicidal. his suicidal ideation means business and is a regular go-to for Eric when he is feeling overwhelmed, depressed, or unsure of what to do next with...

Стоячи в брудному підземному переході серед завалених засцяними ковдрами бомжів я дочитував останні 10 сторінок цієї новели на яких головний герой вирішує свою долю в брудному перевулку Тіхуани оточений горами сміття. Повз нас обох сунули байдужі перехожі. Обидва наші світи занурені в страшну війну якій, здається, нема кінця. Обидві голови зайняті схожими питаннями і приймають схожі виклики в стилі гамлетівського «бути чи не бути»…може саме тому «А тепер зачекайте до минулого року» зайшла мені А...

My 26th PKD novel. It would be silly to start by saying 'This is one of the more challenging Dick novels.' ~ mainly because, in their own ways, each of the author's books is challenging (for one reason or another). It can also be a matter of degrees. That said... much like 'Ubik', 'NWFLY' (great title) can be particularly daunting in its opening chapters - which are dense. ~ and disorienting. But then, so is the world of the novel. Things will become clearer (or, let's say, you may have an easie...

I wonder if William Gibson was influenced by this book when he began his 2014 novel Peripheral (the Jackpot series). Both books deal with mysterious time travel aspects.I have long believed that Gibson was the literary heir to the PKD universe. Gibson’s own anecdote about attending the 1982 film Bladerunner (loosely based on Dick’s 1968 novel Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?) during his writing of Neuromancer was a golden story behind the scenes of two of our most compelling writers. Three a...

თუ დიკი გიყვართ ეს წიგნი იმედებს არ გაგიცრუებთ. თუ არ გიყვართ იმედი მაქვს რომ შეგაყვარებთ. ყველაფერი თითქოს უცვლელია. უიმედობა, დეპრესია, რობოტებში აღმოცენებული ადამიანური გრძნობები, სიგიჟე, ნარკოტიკები და ალტერნატიული რეალობა... და მაინც დიკი ყოველ ჯერზე ახერხებს ჩემს გაოცებას. საინტერესო იყო ომის ფენომენიც ამ წიგნში. ასეა თუ ისე ეს დიკისგან მაინც ახალი იყო(თუ კაცი მაღალ კოშკშის არ ჩავთვლი და ვფიქრობ რომ არცაა ჩასათვლელი).. სადამდე შეიძლება მიგვიყვანოს და რეალურად რომ ვიფიქროთ „სადამდე მივალთ“ ...

Another of the tranche of novels produced in an amphetaminal frenzy in 1963, Now Wait for Last Year is like a compendium of Dick's major obsessions of the period: time travel, mind-altering drugs, multiple versions of people and places, Mad Men-style office dynamics, weird fashions, telepathy. And, of course, his habit of approaching stories through bizarrely obscure corporate entities – so that in this one, we see a three-way intergalactic war from the perspective of a middle manager in the ‘Ti...

“The ethical understructure of medicine, he believed—and it was based on certain very real experiences in his own life—that if a man wanted to die he had the right to die. He did not possess an elaborated rationalization to justify this belief; he had not even tried to construct one. The proposition, to him, seemed self-evident. There was no body of evidence which proved that life in the first place was a boon. Perhaps it was for some persons; obviously it was not for others.”That sounds depress...

Welcome to the science fiction world of Philip K. Dick’s 1966 novel Now Wait for Last Year. We are plunged into the teeth of a mid-twenty-first century interplanetary war: Lillistar, (human-like beings with superhuman strength) vs reggs (human-size semi-mechanical bugs). Just so happens Terra (Planet Earth) is also a potential big player in the outer space battles. The husband and wife team of Kathy and Eric Sweetscent are the novel's main characters. Kathy occupies a key upper-echelon post at T...

"Life is composed of reality configurations so constituted. To abandon her would be to say, I can't endure reality as such. I have to have uniquely special easier conditions."- Philip K. Dick (in Now Wait for Last Year) This is a book for married couples (having difficulties), suicides, drug addicts, politicians, and time travelers -- and it just happens to be one of my favorite PKD novels ever (although ever with Philip Kindred Dick is always a fluid thing).'Now Wait for Last Year' is something...

I treated myself to a rather more obscure PKD book to end out the year. I've always loved just how wonky his works can get, but here's the really interesting aspect of Horselover Fat's writing: it's never really wonky.In fact, it has heart. Especially when that heart is breaking, the story is still devoted to some of those most human questions: how to go on when life is hard.The old saying, "All's fair in love and war" holds doubly true here. Earth is caught in a conflict between two factions of...