Philip K. Dick ~ Dr. Bloodmoney
just finished reading Philip K. Dick’s Dr. Bloodmoney. a post-apocalyptic pastoral that could easily play on-stage, or as a chamber opera, or a radio play, so intrinsic is the human voice to the narrative, psychology and dramatic thrust. but you’d have to work in voices and spirits that live inside or can influence malefically at…
Pete Dexter ~ Paper Trails
just finished reading Pete Dexter’s Paper Trails, subtitled: True Stories of Confusion, Mindless Violence, and Forbidden Desires, a Surprising Number of Which Are Not About Marriage i’ve read all his novels memorable among them Train, Paris Trout and Deadwood (yup, the basis for the HBO series for which they conveniently forgot his masterful source novel;…
Philip K. Dick ~ Martian Time-Slip
just finished reading Philip K. Dick’s Martian Time-Slip, the first novel in the 2nd volume of the new Library of America PKD collection. this one masterfully posits a connection between dysfunctions like schizophrenia and autism and their inherent alienation from reality and further muses about how conception of time and space may be enhanced/sped-up in…
Lawrence Block ~ Hit Parade
just finished reading one of Lawrence Block’s collections of vignettes starring his charming philatelist/hired assassin, Keller, Hit Parade. easy on the eyes, though i have a hard time placing him on the same level as a similarly pseudonymic but eminently superior crime writer, Donald E Westlake. i’m spoiled. just trying to be broad in my…
Best American Fantasy 2006
just finished reading the sizable tome, Best American Fantasy. no, it’s not a biography of my girlfriend. it’s a collection from 2006 edited by Matthew Cheney and Ann & Jeff Vandermeer. it’s most successful when addressing ‘fantasy’ as form instead of genre (y’all should leave dragons to Lucius Shepard, who dabbles in them occasionally though…
Philip K. Dick ~ Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
just finished re-reading Philip K. Dick’s classic basis for the film Blade Runner, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? as usual, PKD takes the reins of a far more complex possibility set than can be sustained in even the best of Hollywood’s Sci-Fi pantheon. still, the droids don’t give up quite so laxly in the…
Seb Doubinsky ~ The Song of Synth
just finished reading Seb Doubinsky‘s haunting novel The Song Of Synth, a tale of hackers, poets, revolutionaries, and multiple levels of deceit and duplicity, underpinned by SYNTH, a reality-enhancing drug (or is it an implied morality/conscience/consciousness?) Seb writes with a great balance of cinematic concision and romance that makes for compelling reading. highly recommended.
Philip K. Dick ~ The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch
just finished re-reading Philip K. Dick’s The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch. drug-induced alternate realities, intra-system life forms, divinity, profanity, a trip you don’t come back from, or an entity from which you can never recede. one of the best of PKD, beautifully illuminated by many passages of The Exegesis of PKD.
Lucius Shepard ~ Five Autobiographies and a Fiction
just finished reading Lucius Shepard‘s latest collection of stories, Five Autobiographies and a Fiction. it seems always to be the case that the latest of Lucius becomes one’s favourite; certainly the case here. all but one (Vacancy, a welcome inclusion in this handsome Subterranean Pressing) new, and each another flabbergasting original. there’s no one with…
Philip K. Dick ~ The Man in the High Castle
just finished reading Philip K. Dick’s 1962 novel, The Man in the High Castle, part of the Library of America’s three-volume collection of the Major Arcana of his novels, curated by Jonathan Lethem, who also was largely responsible for The Exegesis of PKD. after traversing those 800+pages, it was inevitable to revisit PKD’s major work,…