- Paperback: 278 pages
- Publisher: Vintage Books; 1st Vintage Books Ed edition (1 Aug 1992)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0679736654
- ISBN-13: 978-0679736653
- Product Dimensions: 13.1 x 1.8 x 20.3 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (44 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,393,261 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Amazon.co.uk Review
Mind- and reality-bending drugs feature again and again in Philip K. Dick's hugely influential SF stories. A Scanner Darkly is the novel that cuts closest to the bone, drawing on Dick's own experience with illicit chemicals and on his many friends who died through drug misuse. Nevertheless it's blackly farcical, full of comic- surreal conversations between people whose synapses are partly fried, sudden flights of paranoid logic, and bad trips like the one whose victim spends a subjective eternity having all his sins read to him, in shifts, by compound-eyed aliens. (It takes 11,000 years of this to reach the time when as a boy he discovered masturbation.) The antihero Bob Arctor is forced by his double life into warring double personalities: as futuristic narcotics agent "Fred", face blurred by a high-tech scrambler, he must spy on and entrap suspected drug dealer Bob Arctor. His disintegration under the influence of the insidious Substance D is genuine tragicomedy. For Arctor there's no way off the addict's downward escalator, but what awaits at the bottom is a kind of redemption--there are more wheels within wheels than we suspected, and his life is not entirely wasted. In a just world this harrowing novel, the 20th selection in the Millennium SF Masterworks, would have matched the sales of Trainspotting. --David Langford
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
Book Description
A brilliant sci-fi novel from one of the last century's most influential pop culture figures.
--This text refers to an alternate
Paperback
edition.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Dick is renown for his dark, paranoid even delusional visions of the future. But 'A Scanner Darkly' is probably the most accomplished example of this. The story traces the ever declining life of undercover Narc. Bob Arctor, a man so beyond redemption he has given up his family to become a full-time professional police informant. As the story unfolds the lines between Arctor's lives become more and more blurred, a burned out addict on the one hand an undercover agent on the other. All seems well until the mysterious 'substance D' the 'D' being for 'Death' hits the streets and Arctor is assigned to find out what it is and where it comes from.
The assured and confident prose is a sign of this being a work by an author in his prime and very much on home soil, Dick's own life was in a constant state of flux due to his own drug abuse and this gives this novel the touch of realism lacking in so many other drug culture novels.
'A Scanner Darkly' is simply a wonderful look inside addiction, insanity and paranoia. A must for any Phil Dick fan, a great start for any potential converts.
16 of 17 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
A Scanner Darkly was recommended to me by a real sci fi nut of a friend and so when he proclaimed it "The best book I've read in years" I wasn't expecting much as his copy rested neatly beside various Star Wars novels and a Starship Enterprise bookend. What I didn't expect was one of the darkest, most interesting thrillers I've read in years! This book has a unique visual style and whilst Dick quickly forgets his ramblings of how commercialism has encapsulated the near future you are still aware of the edgy neon wasteland right through to the end. The Science Fiction in this novel is subtly intertwined in the life of the agent sent to investigate himself as he lives one life behind an identity destroying "scramble" suit as a Narcotics agent "Fred" and the other as an openly addicted Substance D doper "Bob Arctor". The fiction comes from this suit the 3d holoscanning equipment set up in the investigation and the Drug he's hooked on; Substance D or "Death" which has the clearly defind side affect of seperating the brains hemispheres leading to total loss of spatial awareness and personality segregation which isn't exactly helped by Freds double life. This book deals with the moral issues of drug taking from both sides of the fence and shows, through the entertaining dialogue between doper Bob and his circle of equally spaced friends that drug taking is fun but that you lose a part of yourself with every hit. The resultant consequences of these situations are for the most part predictable but its the scenes in which cop "Fred" watches doper "Bob" that keep you enthralled as Fred at first evaluates the actions of him and his friends living their lives through addiction to the tragic mental downward spiral as he becomes more and more suspicious of Bob Arctor. There are enough twists at the end to keep things at the right level of intrigue and the final chapter in which Bob Arctor reaches the end of his career is both tragic and satisfying. This is a book easily read in a few days but it will certainly stick in your memory for much longer and make you think twice about sparking that last joint you promised yourself. Even if you're no Sci Fi fan, which I may now be after reading this, you're in for one hell of a "Trip"
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is the only Phillip K Dick novel I have read and thoroughly enjoyed.
The ideas conveyed are not particularly that of a science fiction writer but as a human being who lived a life very affected by substance abuse.
Touching, imagenative with a cruel punch at the end, in my opinion the author's best book.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
A Scanner Darkly
I first saw the movie adaptation by Richard Linklater, and that drove me to buy this book and read it in its original form. Read more
Published 2 months ago by ch.adamant
Inspired
A Scanner Darkly is the story of Bob Arctor and his drug using friends. Or rather the story of Agent Bob Arctor who is undercover as a drug user and using his associates to try... Read more
Published 4 months ago by Syriat
Good idea, poorly delivered...
This novel is ok, but clearly not Dick's best. The first half is much better than the second half and the final chapters are the poorest part of the book. Read more
Published 6 months ago by F Drew
Hard work
If you get past the first 100 pages you should make it to the end...This book is very hard to read. The language is dated and a lot of it is specific to 1970's drug culture. Read more
Published 8 months ago by N. Hunt
Not worth pulping
Utter gash. Not up there with his better writing which outdoes the science fiction genre (what IS science fiction?). Read more
Published 13 months ago by K. N. Tole
Good book, not up there with some of his writing.
In terms of sci-fi, the ideas contained in most Philip K. Dick novels leave other writers far behind. Read more
Published 13 months ago by G. Mattu
Love the plot; hate the execution
I always WANT to love Philip K Dick's books. I really do -- but I can't.
He comes up with the most highly inventive & imaginative plots. Read more
He comes up with the most highly inventive & imaginative plots. Read more
Published 14 months ago by Sars
Perhaps the Most Moving of Dick's Works
"Substance D -- otherwise known as Death -- is the most dangerous drug ever to find its way on to the black market. Read more
Published 15 months ago by M. D. Jenkins
A dark narrative of addiction, paranoia and sin
A Scanner Darkly follows the legally ambiguous assignment of Bob Arctor. In a world where the government has lost the fight against narcotics, the law must turn to more and more... Read more
Published 16 months ago by Laura
A dark and suprisingly emotional tale
Having seen the film and being a reader of Philip K. Dick i was keen to read this novel. What i found was a brilliantly written, clever and suprisingly emotional story. Read more
Published 18 months ago by TheReader
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