Episodes
Friday Oct 12, 2018
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 115: Retreat Syndrome
Friday Oct 12, 2018
Friday Oct 12, 2018
My thougths on Philip K. Dick's short story "Retreat Syndrome".
Wednesday Jan 16, 2019
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 127.4: Ubik, Part 4
Wednesday Jan 16, 2019
Wednesday Jan 16, 2019
The quite bleak finale of "Ubik" by Philip K. Dick. It is not entirely clear what is going on as this novel closes. You will either love it or hate it, but in my view it does not ruin a fascinating novel.
Monday Dec 31, 2018
Monday Dec 31, 2018
We reach the climax of "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?". How will Deckard do his job when he realizes that he has developed empathy for androids?
Thursday Jan 24, 2019
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 128.2: Galactic Pot-Healer, 2
Thursday Jan 24, 2019
Thursday Jan 24, 2019
Part 2 of my review of my favorite Philip K. Dick novel "Galactic Pot-healer". Joe Fernwright is guided by the Glimmung to a new life with an actual purpose.
Saturday May 04, 2019
Saturday May 04, 2019
Bob Arctor learns that working undercover is not all it is cracked up to be as he hits rock bottom, loses his sense of identity, and ends up being put through the consuming machine of the state. All of this and more in part 4 (of 5) of my review of Philip K. Dick's A SCANNER DARKLY.
Wednesday Mar 20, 2019
Wednesday Mar 20, 2019
In this wonderful little story ("A Little Something for Us Tempunauts") Philip K. Dick explores the tedious repeatability of space exploration, both for us and for the explorers. Maybe we can do better if we had a real frontier?
Monday Jan 28, 2019
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 128.3: Galactic Pot-Healer, 3
Monday Jan 28, 2019
Monday Jan 28, 2019
This podcast is the third in my series on "Galactic Pot-Healer" by Philip K. Dick. In this part of the novel, we explore the theme of entropy. What does it have to do with meaningful work?
Thursday Apr 04, 2019
Thursday Apr 04, 2019
In part 3 of my review of CONFESSIONS OF A CRAP ARTIST, we watch was one family collapses and another emerges in its wake. The horror of the eternal return of married life is the theme of this splendid novel.
Wednesday Apr 10, 2019
Philip K Dick Book Club: Episode 138.1: Post-Apocalyptic Gnostics (Deus Irae, Part 1)
Wednesday Apr 10, 2019
Wednesday Apr 10, 2019
In this episode, I take on the first half of DEUS IRAE by Philip K. Dick and Roger Zelanzy. It is an odd novel that has a host of narrative and tone issues, but as with all of Dick's novels is always interesting. There are some important previews of the VALIS trilogy themes in this book.
Sunday Apr 14, 2019
Sunday Apr 14, 2019
I complete my look at the odd novel DEUS IRAE by Philip K. Dick and Roger Zelazny in this episode. The core idea of a religious pilgrimage in a shattered world is pretty interesting, if not very well executed here. The secret identity subplot does create some tension toward the end.
Monday Apr 22, 2019
Monday Apr 22, 2019
The first of five episodes covering Philip K. Dick's A SCANNER DARKLY. This novel has some of his most bleak and powerful images of life in late capitalist California and his prescience on failed war on drugs is astounding. One of his best novels.
Friday Apr 26, 2019
Friday Apr 26, 2019
As we get deeper into Philip K. Dick's A SCANNER DARKLY we see just how deeply paranoia runs in a world governed by the police state. But just how much of the paranoia is justified? And how paranoid is the state compared to the people it tries to control?
Monday May 06, 2019
Monday May 06, 2019
In the finale of my review of A SCANNER DARKLY by Philip K. Dick we see the ultimate fate of Bob Arctor and his friends, as well as possibly the fate of all of us in the eternal struggle between the individual and the institution. And this conclusion is set in Dick's greatest depiction of an asylum.
Saturday Mar 16, 2019
Saturday Mar 16, 2019
In the conclusion of WE CAN BUILD YOU by Philip K. Dick, we find ourselves in a very different novel. After a mental breakdown Louis Rosen is institutionalized and we see one of Dick's best descriptions of the asylum.
Wednesday May 08, 2019
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 141: The Day Mr. Computer Fell Out of Its Tree
Wednesday May 08, 2019
Wednesday May 08, 2019
Now we get to some of the strange late Philip K. Dick stories. The first of these is "The Day Mr. Computer Fell Out of Its Tree", in which Dick takes on once again the dangers of automation. One of his first themes was also one of his last.
Sunday May 12, 2019
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 142: The Exit Door Leads In
Sunday May 12, 2019
Sunday May 12, 2019
What did Philip K. Dick think of Watergate and state secrets and the military-industrial complex? I think we know, but if you have any doubt read "The Exit Door Leads In" which was published in ROLLING STONES COLLEGE PAPERS. It is a very nice story Dick published in 1979
Sunday May 12, 2019
Sunday May 12, 2019
Philip K. Dick wrote with brilliance about mental illness and institutionalization throughout his career. Check out this story (the first work of his from the 1980s, I look at), "Strange Memories of Death". It is a mainstream story about living next to the Lysol Lady.
Wednesday May 15, 2019
Wednesday May 15, 2019
In "I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon" (published in PLAYBOY) Philip K. Dick wrote a nice story about change, how we do not trust memories, and how memories may fill in for what we have lost. One of his last stories.
Saturday May 18, 2019
Saturday May 18, 2019
"Rautavaara's Case" by Philip K. Dick is one of his last stories. It uses an interstellar dispute over a man's remains to explore the limits of understanding between cultures and what a truly religious system could look like. This story also asks some nice bio-medical ethics questions.
Saturday May 18, 2019
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 146: Dick's Last Story (The Alien Mind)
Saturday May 18, 2019
Saturday May 18, 2019
"The Alien Mind" was Philip K. Dick's last published story, appearing in The Yuba City High Times in February 1981.
Next up, we will look at the VALIS novels.
Saturday May 25, 2019
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 148: God Help Me!: The Divine Invasion
Saturday May 25, 2019
Saturday May 25, 2019
We have come all this way in order to read Philip K. Dick's most disappointing book. It is an opaque novel that betrays much of what Dick established in his earlier career on what it means to be human and how to respond to power. But share your thoughts.
Wednesday May 29, 2019
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 149: The Transmigration of Timothy Archer
Wednesday May 29, 2019
Wednesday May 29, 2019
The best of Philip K. Dick's later novels is THE TRANSMIGRATION OF TIMOTHY ARCHER. It explores the religious culture of California during Dick's own life. We get some Bishop Pike, some John Allegro and the Dead Sea Scrolls, and some Alan Watts.
Sunday Mar 17, 2019
Sunday Mar 17, 2019
In this lengthy episode, I take a detailed look at FLOW MY TEARS, THE POLICEMAN SAID by Philip K. Dick. It presents a detailed police state, examines class dynamics in authoritarian societies, and has some of Dick's most touching looks at relationships and the futility of liquid relationships.
Sunday Mar 31, 2019
Sunday Mar 31, 2019
This novel (CONFESSIONS OF A CRAP ARTIST) is so good. Prove me wrong. Philip K. Dick is at his best when he is writing about marriage and the strangers who sleep next to us.
Thursday Feb 28, 2019
Thursday Feb 28, 2019
Back to a Philip K. Dick short story with the posthumously published "Cadbury, the Beaver Who Lacked". Is it his final word on marriage? Not quite, but it seems to serve as such.
Sunday Feb 24, 2019
Sunday Feb 24, 2019
In the final part of my review of OUR FRIENDS FROM FROLIX 8 we see the brutal way that equality can be restored in a world where the elite are superior post-humans.
Saturday Mar 09, 2019
Saturday Mar 09, 2019
So they built a Edwin Stanton android, but what can they do with it. And what happens when you fall for your crazy underage co-worker? Find out in part 2 of my review of WE CAN BUILD YOU, by Philip K. Dick
Sunday Feb 10, 2019
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 130.3: A Maze of Death, Part 3
Sunday Feb 10, 2019
Sunday Feb 10, 2019
During a quest to find out where they are, the unfortunate pioneers on Delmak-O begin to learn that their subjectivities are coming true. The results are murderous. Learn about this and more in part 3 of my review of Philip K. Dick's "A Maze of Death."
Tuesday Jan 29, 2019
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 128.4: Galactic Pot-Healer, 4
Tuesday Jan 29, 2019
Tuesday Jan 29, 2019
The conclusion of my thoughts on Philip K. Dick's greatest novel "Galactic Pot-Healer". We are coming to the end of this very long series on Dick's publications of the 1960s. Excited to move into the 1970s with "Maze of Death", the antithesis novel of GPH.
Wednesday Feb 13, 2019
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 130.4: A Maze of Death, Part 4
Wednesday Feb 13, 2019
Wednesday Feb 13, 2019
The finale of my look at Philip K. Dick's A MAZE OF DEATH. Tell me, is this book the antithesis of GALACTIC POT-HEALER?
Friday Feb 01, 2019
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 129: The Electric Ant
Friday Feb 01, 2019
Friday Feb 01, 2019
In Philip K. Dick's final story from the 1960s, "The Electric Ant" we get a mixture of reality bending metaphysics and android anxt.
Friday Feb 15, 2019
Friday Feb 15, 2019
In part one of my review of OUR FRIENDS FROM FROLIX 8, I examine how meritocracy and posthumanism leads to a pretty interesting dystopia.
Sunday Feb 03, 2019
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 130.1: A Maze of Death
Sunday Feb 03, 2019
Sunday Feb 03, 2019
Now for the antithesis to "Galactic Pot-Healer". "A Maze of Death" by Philip K. Dick asks some of the same questions as GPH but comes to very different and bleaker answers. What to make of this?
Thursday Mar 07, 2019
Thursday Mar 07, 2019
In this episode I begin my look at WE CAN BUILD YOU. This novel by Philip K. Dick was written in the early 1960s and feels like one of his conventional novels, but it has a sci-fi twist by giving us a small android building business.
Tuesday Mar 12, 2019
Tuesday Mar 12, 2019
Well, they got an Abe Lincoln bot and all was going well, but they lost their designer and engineer. How can our little startup survive against the big corporations without its greatest minds? Find out in part 3 of my review of WE CAN BUILD YOU.
Thursday Feb 21, 2019
Thursday Feb 21, 2019
In part 3 of my review of "Our Friends from Frolix 8" we see the nature of the friendship offered by aliens and need to wonder what is the best path to institutional change: reform from within, movements from the outside, or help from foreign powers.
Monday Feb 18, 2019
Monday Feb 18, 2019
In part two of my review of OUR FRIENDS FROM FROLIX 8, we get a closer look at the movement culture that emerged to resist the posthumans in power, consider how much it resembles drug dealing, and continue to enjoy watching the back and forth between the New Men and Unusuals, the two varieties of posthumans.
Sunday Apr 07, 2019
Sunday Apr 07, 2019
Is is better to be married or a "crap artist" a bit off his rocker? Dick tries to answer this question in his splendid mainstream novel CONFESSIONS OF A CRAP ARTIST. In this episode I finish off my analysis of this book.
Monday Sep 10, 2018
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 111: Precious Artifact
Monday Sep 10, 2018
Monday Sep 10, 2018
We come to the end of our study of Philip K. Dick's works from 1964 with "Precious Artifact".
Thursday Aug 16, 2018
Philip K. Dick Book Club: Episode 104: Novelty Act
Thursday Aug 16, 2018
Thursday Aug 16, 2018
Mostly this episode contains things we covered in my review of "The Simulacra", but the story "Novelty Act" does differ from the novel's main themes in a few ways.