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Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?: The inspiration behind Blade Runner and Blade Runner 2049 (S.F. MASTERWORKS) by [Philip K. Dick]

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Philip K. Dick

Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?: The inspiration behind Blade Runner and Blade Runner 2049 (S.F. MASTERWORKS) 01 Edition, Kindle Edition

by Philip K. Dick (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

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World War Terminus had left the Earth devastated. Through its ruins, bounty hunter Rick Deckard stalked, in search of the renegade replicants who were his prey. When he wasn't 'retiring' them with his laser weapon,
he dreamed of owning a live animal - the ultimate status symbol in a world all but bereft of animal life.

Then Rick got his chance: the assignment to kill six Nexus-6 targets, for a huge reward. But in Deckard's world things were never that simple, and his assignment quickly turned into a nightmare kaleidoscope of subterfuge and deceit - and the threat of death for the hunter rather than the hunted ...

ISBN-13

978-1780220383
Edition

1st
Publisher

Gateway
Publication date

1 April 2010
Language

English
File size

987 KB
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Amazon Review

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? is a book that most people think they remember, and almost always get more or less wrong. Ridley Scott's film Blade Runner took a lot from it, and threw a lot away; wonderful in itself, it is a flash thriller where Dick's novel is a sober meditation. As we all know, bounty hunter Rick Deckard is stalking a group of androids returned from space with short life spans and murder on their minds--where Scott's Deckard was Harrison Ford, Dick's is a financially over-stretched municipal employee with bills to pay and a depressed wife. In a world where most animals have died, and pet-keeping is a social duty, he can only afford a robot imitation, unless he gets a big financial break. The genetically warped "chickenhead" John Isidore has visions of a tomb-world where entropy has finally won. And everyone plugs in to the spiritual agony of Mercer, whose sufferings for the sins of humanity are broadcast several times a day. Prefiguring the religious obsessions of Dick's last novels, this asks dark questions about identity and altruism. After all, is it right to kill the killers just because Mercer says so? --Roz Kaveney --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

One of the most original practitioners writing any kind of fiction, Dick made most of the European avant-garde seem like navel-gazers in a cul-de-sac ― Sunday Times

My literary hero ― Fay Weldon

For everyone lost in the endlessly multiplicating realities of the modern world, remember: Philip K. Dick got there first ― Terry Gilliam

A masterclass in sci-fi wonderment ― Empire --This text refers to the paperback edition.

Synopsis

Android animals help expiate human guilt over the extermination of real ones. Rick Deckard hunts and 'retires' illegal android humans, and thereby comes to learn that the new messiah, a messenger of hope in a depleted world, may also be a fake, and begins to question just who is human and what human is. Also published under the title BLADE RUNNER. --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

From the Back Cover

21ST CENTURY BOUNTY HUNTER

Through the mean streets of a grim 21st century megalopolis, bounty hunter Rick Deckard stalked, searching out the renegade replicants who were his prey. But this assignment involved Nexus-6 targets and as a result Deckard quickly found himself involved in a nightmare kaleidoscope of violence and subterfuge – and the threat of death for the hunter rather than the hunted…

"A marvellous and complex book, simply written but leaving all kinds of resonance in the mind"
BRIAN ALDISS

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From the Inside Flap

Do Androids Dreams of Electric Sheep? filmed as Blade Runner.
As the eagerly-anticipated new film Blade Runner 2049 finally comes to the screen, rediscover the world of Blade Runner . . .

World War Terminus had left the Earth devastated. Through its ruins, bounty hunter Rick Deckard stalked, in search of the renegade replicants who were his prey. When he wasn't 'retiring' them with his laser weapon, he dreamed of owning a live animal - the ultimate status symbol in a world all but bereft of animal life.

Then Rick got his chance: the assignment to kill six Nexus-6 targets, for a huge reward. But in Deckard's world things were never that simple, and his assignment quickly turned into a nightmare kaleidoscope of subterfuge and deceit - and the threat of death for the hunter, rather than the hunted --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

Book Description

Philip K. Dick's classic SF novel, which was adapted as the film BLADE RUNNER. --This text refers to the paperback edition.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

1

A merry little surge of electricity piped by automatic alarm from the mood organ beside his bed awakened Rick Deckard. Surprised—it always surprised him to find himself awake without prior notice—he rose from the bed, stood up in his multicolored pajamas, and stretched. Now, in her bed, his wife Iran opened her gray, unmerry eyes, blinked, then groaned and shut her eyes again.

“You set your Penfield too weak,” he said to her. “I’ll reset it and you’ll be awake and—”

“Keep your hand off my settings.” Her voice held bitter sharpness. “I don’t want to be awake.”

He seated himself beside her, bent over her, and explained softly. “If you set the surge up high enough, you’ll be glad you’re awake; that’s the whole point. At setting C it overcomes the threshold barring consciousness, as it does for me.” Friendlily, because he felt well-disposed toward the world—his setting had been at D—he patted her bare, pale shoulder.

“Get your crude cop’s hand away,” Iran said.

“I’m not a cop.” He felt irritable, now, although he hadn’t dialed for it.

“You’re worse,” his wife said, her eyes still shut. “You’re a murderer hired by the cops.”

“I’ve never killed a human being in my life.” His irritability had risen now; had become outright hostility.

Iran said, “Just those poor andys.”

“I notice you’ve never had any hesitation as to spending the bounty money I bring home on whatever momentarily attracts your attention.” He rose, strode to the console of his mood organ. “Instead of saving,” he said, “so we could buy a real sheep, to replace that fake electric one upstairs. A mere electric animal, and me earning all that I’ve worked my way up to through the years.” At his console he hesitated between dialing for a thalamic suppressant (which would abolish his mood of rage) or a thalamic stimulant (which would make him irked enough to win the argument).

“If you dial,” Iran said, eyes open and watching, “for greater venom, then I’ll dial the same. I’ll dial the maximum and you’ll see a fight that makes every argument we’ve had up to now seem like nothing. Dial and see; just try me.” She rose swiftly, loped to the console of her own mood organ, stood glaring at him, waiting.

He sighed, defeated by her threat. “I’ll dial what’s on my schedule for today.” Examining the schedule for January 3, 2021, he saw that a businesslike professional attitude was called for. “If I dial by schedule,” he said warily, “will you agree to also?” He waited, canny enough not to commit himself until his wife had agreed to follow suit.

“My schedule for today lists a six-hour self-accusatory depression,” Iran said.

“What? Why did you schedule that?” It defeated the whole purpose of the mood organ. “I didn’t even know you could set it for that,” he said gloomily.

“I was sitting here one afternoon,” Iran said, “and naturally I had turned on ‘Buster Friendly and His Friendly Friends’ and he was talking about a big news item he’s about to break and then that awful commercial came on, the one I hate; you know, for Mountibank Lead Codpieces. And so for a minute I shut off the sound. And I heard the building, this building; I heard the—” She gestured.

“Empty apartments,” Rick said. Sometimes he heard them at night when he was supposed to be asleep. And yet, for this day and age a one-half occupied conapt building rated high in the scheme of population density; out in what had been before the war the suburbs, one could find buildings entirely empty . . . or so he had heard. He had let the information remain secondhand; like most people he did not care to experience it directly.

“At that moment,” Iran said, “when I had the TV sound off, I was in a 382 mood; I had just dialed it. So although I heard the emptiness intellectually, I didn’t feel it. My first reaction consisted of being grateful that we could afford a Penfield mood organ. But then I realized how unhealthy it was, sensing the absence of life, not just in this building but everywhere, and not reacting—do you see? I guess you don’t. But that used to be considered a sign of mental illness; they called it ‘absence of appropriate affect.’ So I left the TV sound off and I sat down at my mood organ and I experimented. And I finally found a setting for despair.” Her dark, pert face showed satisfaction, as if she had achieved something of worth. “So I put it on my schedule for twice a month; I think that’s a reasonable amount of time to feel hopeless about everything, about staying here on Earth after everybody who’s smart has emigrated, don’t you think?”

“But a mood like that,” Rick said, “you’re apt to stay in it, not dial your way out. Despair like that, about total reality, is self-perpetuating.”

“I program an automatic resetting for three hours later,” his wife said sleekly. “A 481. Awareness of the manifold possibilities open to me in the future; new hope that—”

“I know 481,” he interrupted. He had dialed out the combination many times; he relied on it greatly. “Listen,” he said, seating himself on his bed and taking hold of her hands to draw her down beside him, “even with an automatic cutoff it’s dangerous to undergo a depression, any kind. Forget what you’ve scheduled and I’ll forget what I’ve scheduled; we’ll dial a 104 together and both experience it, and then you stay in it while I reset mine for my usual businesslike attitude. That way I’ll want to hop up to the roof and check out the sheep and then head for the office; meanwhile I’ll know you’re not sitting here brooding with no TV.” He released her slim, long fingers, passed through the spacious apartment to the living room, which smelled faintly of last night’s cigarettes. There he bent to turn on the TV.

From the bedroom Iran’s voice came. “I can’t stand TV before breakfast.”

“Dial 888,” Rick said as the set warmed. “The desire to watch TV, no matter what’s on it.”

“I don’t feel like dialing anything at all now,” Iran said.

“Then dial 3,” he said.

“I can’t dial a setting that stimulates my cerebral cortex into wanting to dial! If I don’t want to dial, I don’t want to dial that most of all, because then I will want to dial, and wanting to dial is right now the most alien drive I can imagine; I just want to sit here on the bed and stare at the floor.” Her voice had become sharp with overtones of bleakness as her soul congealed and she ceased to move, as the instinctive, omnipresent film of great weight, of an almost absolute inertia, settled over her.

He turned up the TV sound, and the voice of Buster Friendly boomed out and filled the room. “—ho ho, folks. Time now for a brief note on today’s weather. The Mongoose satellite reports that fallout will be especially pronounced toward noon and will then taper off, so all you folks who’ll be venturing out—”

Appearing beside him, her long nightgown trailing wispily, Iran shut off the TV set. “Okay, I give up; I’ll dial. Anything you want me to be; ecstatic sexual bliss—I feel so bad I’ll even endure that. What the hell. What difference does it make?”

“I’ll dial for both of us,” Rick said, and led her back into the bedroom. There, at her console, he dialed 594: pleased acknowledgment of husband’s superior wisdom in all matters. On his own console he dialed for a creative and fresh attitude toward his job, although this he hardly needed; such was his habitual, innate approach without recourse to Penfield artificial brain stimulation.

After a hurried breakfast—he had lost time due to the discussion with his wife—he ascended clad for venturing out, including his Ajax model Mountibank Lead Codpiece, to the covered roof pasture whereon his electric sheep “grazed.” Whereon it, sophisticated piece of hardware that it was, chomped away in simulated contentment, bamboozling the other tenants of the building.

Of course, some of their animals undoubtedly consisted of electronic circuitry fakes, too; he had of course never nosed into the matter, any more than they, his neighbors, had pried into the real workings of his sheep. Nothing could be more impolite. To say, “Is your sheep genuine?” would be a worse breach of manners than to inquire whether a citizen’s teeth, hair, or internal organs would test out authentic.

The morning air, spilling over with radioactive motes, gray and sun-beclouding, belched about him, haunting his nose; he sniffed involuntarily the taint of death. Well, that was too strong a description for it, he decided as he made his way to the particular plot of sod which he owned along with the unduly large apartment below. The legacy of World War Terminus had diminished in potency; those who could not survive the dust had passed into oblivion years ago, and the dust, weaker now and confronting the strong survivors, only deranged minds and genetic properties. Despite his lead codpiece, the dust—undoubtedly—filtered in and at him, brought him daily, so long as he failed to emigrate, its little load of befouling filth. So far, medical checkups taken monthly confirmed him as a regular: a man who could reproduce within the tolerances set by law. Any month, however, the exam by the San Francisco Police Department doctors could reveal otherwise. Continually, new specials came into existence, created out of regulars by the omnipresent dust. The saying currently blabbed by posters, TV ads, and government junk mail, ran: “Emigrate or degenerate! The choice is yours!” Very true, Rick thought as he opened the gate to his little pasture and approached his electric sheep. But I can’t emigrate, he said to himself. Because of my job.

The owner of the adjoining pasture, his conapt neighbor Bill Barbour, hailed him; he, like Rick, had dressed for work but had stopped off on the way to check his animal, too.

“My horse,” Barbour declared beamingly, “is pregnant.” He indicated the big Percheron, which stood staring off in an empty fashion into space. “What do you say to that?”

“I say pretty soon you’ll have two horses,” Rick said. He had reached his sheep now; it lay ruminating, its alert eyes fixed on him in case he had brought any rolled oats with him. The alleged sheep contained an oat-tropic circuit; at the sight of such cereals it would scramble up convincingly and amble over. “What’s she pregnant by?” he asked Barbour. “The wind?”

“I bought some of the highest quality fertilizing plasma available in California,” Barbour informed him. “Through inside contacts I have with the State Animal Husbandry Board. Don’t you remember last week when their inspector was out here examining Judy? They’re eager to have her foal; she’s an unmatched superior.” Barbour thumped his horse fondly on the neck and she inclined her head toward him.

“Ever thought of selling your horse?” Rick asked. He wished to god he had a horse, in fact any animal. Owning and maintaining a fraud had a way of gradually demoralizing one. And yet from a social standpoint it had to be done, given the absence of the real article. He had therefore no choice except to continue. Even were he not to care himself, there remained his wife, and Iran did care. Very much.

Barbour said, “It would be immoral to sell my horse.”

“Sell the colt, then. Having two animals is more immoral than not having any.”

Puzzled, Barbour said, “How do you mean? A lot of people have two animals, even three, four, and like in the case of Fred Washborne, who owns the algae-processing plant my brother works at, even five. Didn’t you see that article about his duck in yesterday’s Chronicle? It’s supposed to be the heaviest, largest Moscovy on the West Coast.” The man’s eyes glazed over, imagining such possessions; he drifted by degrees into a trance.

Exploring about in his coat pockets, Rick found his creased, much-studied copy of Sidney’s Animal & Fowl Catalogue January supplement. He looked in the index, found colts (vide horses, offsp.) and presently had the prevailing national price. “I can buy a Percheron colt from Sidney’s for five thousand dollars,” he said aloud.

“No you can’t,” Barbour said. “Look at the listing again; it’s in italics. That means they don’t have any in stock, but that would be the price if they did have.”

“Suppose,” Rick said, “I pay you five hundred dollars a month for ten months. Full catalogue value.”

Pityingly, Barbour said, “Deckard, you don’t understand about horses; there’s a reason why Sidney’s doesn’t have any Percheron colts in stock. Percheron colts just don’t change hands—at catalogue value, even. They’re too scarce, even relatively inferior ones.” He leaned across their common fence, gesticulating. “I’ve had Judy for three years, and not in all that time have I seen a Percheron mare of her quality. To acquire her I had to fly to Canada, and I personally drove her back here myself to make sure she wasn’t stolen. You bring an animal like this anywhere around Colorado or Wyoming and they’ll knock you off to get hold of it. You know why? Because back before W.W.T. there existed literally hundreds—”

“But,” Rick interrupted, “for you to have two horses and me none, that violates the whole basic theological and moral structure of Mercerism.”

“You have your sheep; hell, you can follow the Ascent in your individual life, and when you grasp the two handles of empathy, you approach honorably. Now if you didn’t have that old sheep, there, I’d see some logic in your position. Sure, if I had two animals and you didn’t have any, I’d be helping deprive you of true fusion with Mercer. But every family in this building—let’s see; around fifty: one to every three apts, as I compute it—every one of us has an animal of some sort. Graveson has that chicken over there.” He gestured north. “Oakes and his wife have that big red dog that barks in the night.” He pondered. “I think Ed Smith has a cat down in his apt; at least he says so, but no one’s ever seen it. Possibly he’s just pretending.”

Going over to his sheep, Rick bent down, searching in the thick white wool—the fleece at least was genuine—until he found what he was looking for: the concealed control panel of the mechanism. As Barbour watched, he snapped open the panel covering, revealing it. “See?” he said to Barbour. “You understand now why I want your colt so badly?”

After an interval Barbour said, “You poor guy. Has it always been this way?”

“No,” Rick said, once again closing the panel covering of his electric sheep; he straightened up, turned, and faced his neighbor. “I had a real sheep, originally. My wife’s father gave it to us outright when he emigrated. Then, about a year ago, remember that time I took it to the vet—you were up here that morning when I came out and found it lying on its side and it couldn’t get up.”

“You got it to its feet,” Barbour said, remembering and nodding. “Yeah, you managed to lift it up but then after a minute or two of walking around it fell over again.”

Rick said, “Sheep get strange diseases. Or put another way, sheep get a lot of diseases but the symptoms are always the same; the sheep can’t get up and there’s no way to tell how serious it is, whether it’s a sprained leg or the animal’s dying of tetanus. That’s what mine died of: tetanus.”

“Up here?” Barbour said. “On the roof?”

“The hay,” Rick explained. “That one time I didn’t get all the wire off the bale; I left a piece and Groucho—that’s what I called him then—got a scratch and in that way contracted tetanus. I took him to the vet’s and he died, and I thought about it, and finally I called one of those shops that manufacture artificial animals and I showed them a photograph of Groucho. They made this.” He indicated the reclining ersatz animal, which continued to ruminate attentively, still watching alertly for any indication of oats. “It’s a premium job. And I’ve put as much time and attention into caring for it as I did when it was real. But—” He shrugged.

“It’s not the same,” Barbour finished.

“But almost. You feel the same doing it; you have to keep your eye on it exactly as you did when it was really alive. Because they break down and then everyone in the building knows. I’ve had it at the repair shop six times, mostly little malfunctions, but if anyone saw them—for instance one time the voice tape broke or anyhow got fouled and it wouldn’t stop baaing—they’d recognize it as a mechanical breakdown.” He added, “The repair outfit’s truck is of course marked ‘animal hospital something.’ And the driver dresses like a vet, completely in white.” He glanced suddenly at his watch, remembering the time. “I have to get to work,” he said to Barbour. “I’ll see you this evening.”

As he started toward his car, Barbour called after him hurriedly, “Um, I won’t say anything to anybody here in the building.”

Pausing, Rick started to say thanks. But then something of the despair that Iran had been talking about tapped him on the shoulder and he said, “I don’t know; maybe it doesn’t make any difference.”

“But they’ll look down on you. Not all of them, but some. You know how people are about not taking care of an animal; they consider it immoral and anti-empathic. I mean, technically it’s not a crime like it was right after W.W.T., but the feeling’s still there.”

“God,” Rick said futilely, and gestured empty-handed. “I want to have an animal; I keep trying to buy one. But on my salary, on what a city employee makes—” If, he thought, I could get lucky in my work again. As I did two years ago when I managed to bag four andys during one month. If I had known then, he thought, that Groucho was going to die . . . but that had been before the tetanus. Before the two-inch piece of broken, hypodermic-like baling wire.

“You could buy a cat,” Barbour offered. “Cats are cheap; look in your Sidney’s catalogue.”

Rick said quietly, “I don’t want a domestic pet. I want what I originally had, a large animal. A sheep, or if I can get the money, a cow or a steer or what you have, a horse.” The bounty from retiring five andys would do it, he realized. A thousand dollars apiece, over and above my salary. Then somewhere I could find, from someone, what I want. Even if the listing in Sidney’s Animal & Fowl is in italics. Five thousand dollars—but, he thought, the five andys first have to make their way to Earth from one of the colony planets; I can’t control that, I can’t make five of them come here, and even if I could, there are other bounty hunters with other police agencies throughout the world. The andys would specifically have to take up residence in Northern California, and the senior bounty hunter in this area, Dave Holden, would have to die or retire.

“Buy a cricket,” Barbour suggested wittily. “Or a mouse. Hey, for twenty-five bucks you can buy a full-grown mouse.”

Rick said, “Your horse could die, like Groucho died, without warning. When you get home from work this evening you could find her laid out on her back, her feet in the air, like a bug. Like what you said, a cricket.” He strode off, car key in his hand.

“Sorry if I offended you,” Barbour said nervously.

In silence Rick Deckard plucked open the door of his hovercar. He had nothing further to say to his neighbor; his mind was on his work, on the day ahead. --This text refers to an alternate kindle_edition edition.

About the Author

Philip K Dick was born in Chicago in 1928 and lived most of his life in California. He attended college for a year at Berkeley. Apart from writing, his main interest was music. He won the Hugo Award for his classic novel of alternative history, ‘The Man in the High Castle’ (1962). He was married five times and had three children. He died in March 1982.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B003FXCSNQ
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Gateway; 1st edition (1 April 2010)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 987 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Print length ‏ : ‎ 242 pages
Page numbers source ISBN ‏ : ‎ 1524796972

Best Sellers Rank: 10,247 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
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Philip K. Dick

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Over a writing career that spanned three decades, Philip K. Dick (1928-1982) published 36 science fiction novels and 121 short stories in which he explored the essence of what makes man human and the dangers of centralized power. Toward the end of his life, his work turned toward deeply personal, metaphysical questions concerning the nature of God. Eleven novels and short stories have been adapted to film; notably: Blade Runner (based on Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?), Total Recall, Minority Report, and A Scanner Darkly. The recipient of critical acclaim and numerous awards throughout his career, Dick was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in 2005, and in 2007 the Library of America published a selection of his novels in three volumes. His work has been translated into more than twenty-five languages.

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Antonio

Unforgettable And Brilliant

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 30 August 2016

Verified Purchase

This book is incredible, I've known about it for years, but always overlooked it because I've seen the film. You have to read a PKD book to appreciate how good he was; and this book is a work of genius.
He crams so much information into every paragraph, but it's not banal or mundane, every sentence is fascinating. The creative prose oozes from every page, leaving you mesmerized. There have been many great writers, but it's a rarity to find one who not only invents fantastic stories but also put them into magical words.
If you've never read a PKD novel start here and, like me, I guarantee you, you will send off for a stack more.
His writing is so clever, loaded with detail, that paints a flawless picture in your mind of every scene. And the humor in his books is incredibly good; how I laugh when reading his novels. Jane Austen,; he is not.
PKD is out there on his own; no one else comes close to his unique brilliance.

51 people found this helpful

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F Brown

Fantastic original novel - there's a lot more here than Bladerunner

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 11 August 2017

Verified Purchase

I love Bladerunner, so thought I knew what to expect from this novel, but there is so much more in the book, and it is so different - highly recommended! Where Bladerunner tends to focus more on the action, with introspection taking a bit of a back seat, here it is the opposite. We see a lot more of Deckard's life and thoughts here, as he struggles both financially and emotionally to survive in the post-apocalyptic world of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? We also have a secondary POV in the 'chickenhead' John Isidore and learn a great deal more about the consequences for the human population of Dick's world. Particularly powerful is the prestige attached to looking after live animals, so much so that Deckard begins the novel resenting his electric sheep which he must pretend is real to maintain his social standing. Absorbing, fascinating and exciting - plenty to engage and surprise even those who know the film well.

21 people found this helpful

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Alessandro

This is not blade runner.....

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 14 April 2019

Verified Purchase

I just wonder how many people after watching blade runner have decided to read this book only to realize how different really is.
Many version of the book ,in my country in particular , have been even sold with the title of blade runner instead of the original one, yes that title.....it could have put off so many readers want to be, but it does so much sense once you are in the process of reading this masterpiece of sci fi , and change the name of the book has the only target of selling more copies , as as I said are two completely different stories.
So much have been said on Dick and this book so there is nothing I can add apart that I have finished few weeks ago and the feeling that has left is still fresh in my mind.
I was a little disappointed by the length of the novel ( very short ) but who am I to judge a novel that has influenced the last 50 years of sci fi writing ? ,a must read for any sci-fi fan.

9 people found this helpful

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A Brilliant Novel

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 31 May 2021

Verified Purchase

Philip K Dick’s novel that was first published in 1968 is always well worth reading, and over the years has built up a large following, mainly due to the success of the two Blade Runner films. If you have only ever seen the films before though, then be prepared, as the book is different in a number of ways.

The tale is set in 1992 and there has been a nuclear war leaving Earth in a rather poor state. Many have left, colonising other planets but there are still people on our planet, some of which due to various reasons will never be allowed to leave. Our main character is Rick Deckard who lives with his wife in the remains of San Francisco and works as a bounty hunter for the police department, hunting for illegal androids. He has been given a new assignment as the lead bounty hunter has been attacked by an android and is hospitalized. With the latest such humanoid, with a Nexus-6 frame so detecting them is not as easy as with older models. Thus Rick knows who he is after, but at the same time with the makers of the device needed for assistance, so this corporation knows what is used to detect their devices, and thus can make improvements.

Dick made known in his lifetime what the influences of this book were, and where they came from, but since then, what with the film, so the story has become highly influential on many in different areas of the media. We have the overarching theme here which is what is real and what is fake, but there are many other elements added, such as empathy, the part that religion plays in many people’s lives, and the damage that we do to our environment. Here for instance, due to the nuclear holocaust that happened there is a depletion in animals, and thus to own a real animal and not a robotic simulation is a social status indicator.

There is also a metaphysical element, and it has to be admitted an irony that runs throughout this, and you will immediately notice some of the humour from the very beginning. Rick and his wife when they first wake up here use mood organs to sort out their feelings, rather like some sort of drug and alcohol replacement that many rely upon. By experimentation Iran Deckard, Rick’s wife has found that you can dial up a sense of overwhelming despair and apathy, thus becoming highly depressed. With the androids who have illegally entered Earth from other planets, so we can see that although they might have committed violence and murder elsewhere, in fact coming here all they can at most hope for are a few years in some sort of freedom, although this planet is really a dystopia. This can be seen as a comment on slavery, as you can be free in one place, but a slave elsewhere.

With androids being programmed with false memories, so some do not even know what they really are, and this thus raises the issue of memory and how it works. There are just so many layers to this wonderful book that I like many have read this numerous times, but still keep coming back to it. In all this is not only just a pleasure to read, but very thought provoking.

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Mr. J. Hastings

Weird

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 10 September 2018

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This is one of the weirdest books I have ever read, as Rick Deckard pursues and retires (kills) rogue Nexus-6 androids in a derelict city on an Earth cloaked by radioactive dust.

However, in spite of being written in 1968, it has some relevance for us. We no longer fear nuclear war but we are warming the planet to dangerous levels which will result in sea-level rises and climate changes which will render much of the world uninhabitable as well as causing a great mass extinction of many animal species. Perhaps there will soon be a market for ‘electric’ pets instead of live ones.

In the book, the solution is to colonise other planets but this is simply impracticable, even though the idea was endorsed by the late Stephen Hawking. This is the only planet we have and we should start to take better care of it.

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Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?: The inspiration behind Blade Runner and Blade Runner 2049 (S.F. MASTERWORKS) 01 Edition, Kindle Edition

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