Showing results by author "Philip Dick" in All Categories

This third volume of Great Sci-Fi Stories contains "Young Man from Elsewhen" by Sylvia Jacobs, "Asleep in Armageddon" by Ray Bradbury, "Living Space" by Isaac Asimov, and more.

Twenty-four of the greatest science fiction stories of all time in this fourth sci-fi short story collection, including works by Jerry Dunham, Emmett Dowell, James Causey, Gordon Randall Garrett, James A. Cox, Phyllis Sterling Smith, Richard A. Sternbach, Robert Sheckley, E. G. Von Wald, Keith Laumer, Jerome Bixby, Frederik Pohl, Roger Dee, Arnold Marmore, James H. Schmitz, Lester del Rey, Cordwainer Smith, Ray Bradbury, and Philip K. Dick.

As curator of the Twentieth Century Exhibit, George Miller felt that to do a good job, he had to live his work. Then, one day, somebody got into his exhibit, and he went to investigate.

Following a devastating nuclear war, the Moral Reclamation government took over the world and forced its citizens to live by strictly puritanical rules - no premarital sex, drunkenness, or displaying of neon signs - all of which are reinforced through a constant barrage of public messages. The chief purveyor of these messages is Alan Purcell, next in line to become head of the propaganda bureau. But there is just one problem: a statue of the government’s founder has been vandalized.

The Crawlers is a science ficion short story by American writer Philip K. Dick. Submitted under the title "Foundling Home", it was first published as The Crawlers in Imagination magazine, July 1954. The story starts out from the point of view of a crawler constructing one of its curious hives. The crawler seems sentient and to genuinely enjoy building its odd dwelling. The story is set in a small Midwestern town, with references later in the story to mysterious "pools" which seem to cause mutations.

A trading spaceship often has to carry unusual cargo. But none as strange as the blubberous pig-like alien known as the wub. The captain of the ship decides that the wub may make an excellent meal for him and the crew. But the wub might have something to say about it.

Taylor felt life was pretty good. Sure living in an underground bunker developing more sophisticated weapons to bomb the Soviets was less than ideal. But he had a pretty wife, and he was safe from the radioactive poisoned environment that existed above ground. The leadies, a sophisticated robot servant, could inform them of the devastating destruction, the bombed out cities, and the further Soviet attacks. But it was a strange fact that the latest leadie to return to the bunker showed no sign of radioactivity.

Precorrendo i motivi cari al cyberpunk, Philip K. Dick affonda la penna nei temi della decadenza, delle fantasie cosmiche e delle inquietudini interiori che attanagliano l'uomo moderno. Chi o cos'è Valis? È un'imperscrutabile entità intelligente che vive nello spazio? O forse un meccanismo, una formula o, ancora, un essere vivente vero e proprio, che emana uno sconvolgente flusso di informazioni sulla natura dell'universo?

Milton Lumky territory is both an area of the western United States and a psychic terrain: the world and worldview of the traveling salesman. The story takes place in Boise, Idaho, with some extraordinary long-distance driving sequences in which our hero (young Bruce Stevens) drives from Boise to San Francisco, to Reno, to Pocatello, to Seattle, and back to Boise in search of a good deal on some wholesale typewriters.

In "The Gun", a group of space explorers are shot down above a deserted planet. While some of the crew work on repairing the ship, the remainder set out to investigate the planet. Otherwise unpopulated, they discover the huge gun that shot them down sitting atop a trove of cultural artifacts from a bygone civilization. What harm could come of dismantling the gun and taking a few of the artifacts home with them?

In "The Skull", a convict is offered his freedom if he agrees to travel back in time and kill someone. He learns that the assassination target was the founder of a religious sect that grew in strength and influence from its inception in 1960. Carrying his target's skull so he can identify the religious leader, the convict comes to learn a terrible secret about why he was chosen to find its owner.

In this P. K. Dick short story read by award-winning narrator Mike Vendetti almost everyone had a bomb shelter, but if they didn't have the latest model, chances where they wouldn't survive a nuclear attack. Mike Foster's dad wouldn't be bullied into buying a shelter until finally one Christmas he signed up for the easy payment plan and....

In a 1978 interview, Phillip K. Dick said "I've always had this funny feeling about reality. It just seems very feeble to me sometimes. It doesn't seem to have the substantiality that it's suppose to have." Fortunately for us, Dick translated his feelings about reality into some of the greatest science fiction writing of all time. This collection features five stories from early in his career, when he found his voice as a writer.

In this collection of five stories, all first published in the 1950s, Dick justified his existence by exploring a number of truly interesting ideas. In “Small Town” a man creates a perfect scale model of his own town, as a means of escaping his unbearable reality. In “Human Is” the wife of a scientist notices that her husband has returned from a scientific expedition a changed man, but she’s not complaining. In “Foster, You’re Dead” a father’s unwillingness to participate in his country’s preparations for a war that never happens, leads to unexpected consequences for his family....

An army doctor on Earth is puzzled by a soldier who returns from asteroid Y-3 claiming he's a plant. As more men and women on the asteroid claim they're plants, the doctor decides to travel to the asteroid to solve the enigma. During his investigation, he discovers the soldiers believe they have been turned into plants by natives in the asteroid's woods called Pipers. The doctor goes into the woods in search of the Pipers and discovers a strange young woman.

A short story by Philip K. Dick, first published in Space Science Fiction Magazine, in May 1953. A nuclear war between the Soviet Union and the West has reduced much of the world to a barren wasteland. The war continues, however, among the scattered remains of humanity. The Western forces have recently developed "claws", which are autonomous self-replicating robots, to fight on their side. It is one of Dick's many stories in which nuclear war has rendered the Earth's surface uninhabitable.

Whatever it was that stimulated his creative juices, we are the lucky beneficiaries, as demonstrated in this collection of five stories, all first published in 1954. In “Exhibit Piece” a long-suffering museum worker becomes a little too attached to his display of mid-20th century lifestyle. In “Upon the Dull Earth” a young man refuses to let go of his soul mate, and he creates a chain reaction that he couldn’t have anticipated. In “Progeny” one man’s idea of how to raise a child is challenged by new, more scientific techniques. Also includes "The Last of the Masters", and "Breakfast at Twilight."

Lester Herrick, human of the future, he is by our standards rather inhuman. When Lester returns from a trip to Rexor IV a changed man, the divorce is off, and Mrs. Herrick enjoys her wedded bliss until the authorities suspect Lester isn't Lester.

Mary Anne Reynolds is young, vulnerable, and looking for love in Pacific Park, California. During her brief affairs with a middle-aged record shop owner and then a black blues singer, she seems to only succeed in offending the people living in the small-town of Pacific Park, both by her choice of lifestyle and choice of suitors.

In The Defenders, the Soviet and American survivors of a nuclear holocaust have created vast underground tunnels, so as to continue the war on the surface via remote control robots. When a robot from the surface is found not to be radioactive, a team of American scientists returns topside to investigate this anomaly. Expecting to see massive devastation, the scientists are unprepared for the shocking truth that awaits them.