The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick Vol 5 The Eye of the Sybil and Other Classics By Philip K. Dick

The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick Vol 5
The Eye of the Sybil and Other Classics
By Philip K. Dick

Introduction by Thomas M. Disch
Author Thomas Disch remarks that there are writers that readers read and there are readers writers read. While Philip K. Dick’s stories got lost in time for a while, they have returned and a new generation is discovering them.

The Little Black Box
Two proponents of the religion known as Mercerism are harassed by a state department bent on wiping out the nascent religion as it grows in popularity through an Empathy Box that allows his followers to experience their savior’s torment as stones are hurled at his as he walks through the desert.

Philip K. Dick expands upon the dystopian religion he introduced in Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. We get a better idea of how it developed in its early days and how Empathy Boxes were once contraband. Superb short story with interesting characters and a well-paced plot.

The War with the Fnools
Government agencies are at war with an alien race trying to invade the earth. The Fnools try to blend in by duplicating humans in every day occupations. Their new gig is as real estate salesmen. However, Fnools are easy to spot because they are only two foot tall. However, when a captured Fnool takes a drag off a cigarette, he doubles in size. He adds another two feet when he has a swig of whiskey. Now, at six foot tall, he sneaks into the agency’s bomb shelter where a secretary is hiding. He returns from there eight feet tall. Mankind might have a battle on its hands if the Fnools decide to take up vices.

This alien invasions story was a little light and silly for me. It’s obvious that, for whatever reason, Dick was trying to keep it just that way and make the end just a bit risqué. There was nothing wrong in the writing. Just not my kind of story.

Precious Artifact
Earth is devastated after an interplanetary war and human terraformers are sent to Mars to prepare the planet for human habitation. The most successful of the terraformers, Mitt Biskle, wants to return to Earth. A psychologist tries to discourage him, reminding him that his family is en route from Earth to join him on Mars. He travels to Earth and immediately becomes suspicious that human beings are all but gone from the planet and that their enemy, The Proxima.

This is the heavy, meaty science fiction that Dick produces so well in his short fiction. Complex and full of emotion, Precious Artifact delivers an emotional climax with a wonderful twist.

Retreat Syndrome
Did John Cuppertino murder his wife as he believes? Or is she fine and living in Los Angeles as his psychologist tells him? Is he living in San Jose and working at a middle management job? Or is he in a prison on Ganymede? Is his mind being manipulated by an unscrupulous government and/or an unscrupulous corporation? Or is he insane?

Dick wrote many of these stories where false memories are implanted or created to delude the hero of the story. This one is okay, but falls just a bit short of creating a mood of desperation on John Cuppertino’s part.

A Terran Odyssey
This tells the story of several members of a post-nuclear war society where man and animals have mutated into strange beings with curious habits. The tales of a trap maker, a little girl with her brother living inside her and a disc jockey interweve.

As we see Dick’s short stories growing longer as he progresses with age and development, they become increasingly intricate. This tale is one of his most intricate short stories. The sparse character development actually serves to increase the dystopian feel. Wonderfully told from multiple points of view, the story eventually ends where we knew it needed to.

A Terran Odyssey was not published in Dick’s lifetime. It became part of his novel, Dr. Bloodmoney.

Your Appointment Will be Yesterday
Time flows backwards for many in the future thanks to a nifty little invention. But when a saboteur threatens to put time in the forward flow again, agents have to act today (which is yesterday) to prevent it to preserve their way of life.

It’s an inventive premise but a wholly unsatisfying story with too many plot holes to overlook even in a short story.

Holy Quarrel
A computer repairman is awakened by military intelligence. He is summoned to work on the Genux-B computer that monitors military movements all over the world to determine the likelihood of war. The computer believes the country is at war and that the enemy is in northern California. The culprit is an evil gumball vendor and his products.

Perhaps an argument against computerization is made here in the early days of computerization. There was a strong fear of computers and computer errors when they first entered the mainstream. The gumball angle is not as stupid as it sounds.

A Game of Unchance
A Mars settlement is visited by an interstellar travelling amusement show. They offer games of chance that offer prizes of small dolls. A local man figures out how to activate the dolls and bring them to life, unleashing a menace upon the planet and perhaps the galaxy.

This is the old fashioned science fiction that I like and few write it as well as Dick.

Not By Its Cover
Books, bound in Wub fur are defective. The type changes to reflect a belief in life unending. The publisher is most distressed that the books they are publishing with these very expensive covers and binding are defective. They search for clues as to who is changing the text and how it is being done.

Dick revisits his first ever short story, Therein Lies the Wub. Wubs, creatures of Mars, seem like primitive creatures. But there fur has properties unseen and heretofore unobserved. A thoroughly enjoyable story.

Return Match
A killer pinball machine stalks a detective who raided a casino where it was housed. Aliens brought it to earth and put it in their casino to play a dirty trick on earthlings.

I love the premise and the straight-forward science fiction. But this story is clumsy and falls flat. I think Dick was trying for commentary on impulse and gambling. It didn’t work.

Faith of our Fathers
In a future world where the communists rule the globe, a young party official purchases what he thinks is snuff from a street vendor. It is actually a drug that allows him to see the truth. He finds out that the party leader is not what he seems. He is much, much more.

Dark and heavy story telling from Dick in this masterpiece. Dick often dabbles in alternative futures with government and culture. This is a superb example. This particular story was published in Harlan Ellison’s Dangerous Visions and was one of the best in that legendary collection.

The Story to End All Stories for Harlan Ellison’s Anthology Dangerous Visions
A woman copulates with a mutant animal in a post-nuclear war zoo and gives birth to another mutant. She is forced to fight another woman for possession of it.

This story might have totaled 500 words and I suspect that it was some sort of inside joke between Dick and Harlan Ellison

The Electric Ant
A man goes to the hospital following the amputation of his hand. There, he learns that he is not really a man, but a synthetic human. To learn the nature of himself and the fabric of time, he begins to tamper with his memory systems and discovers who and what is real and who is not. Others make the same discovery.

This is a subject explored in the subtext of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep. What does it mean to be human? In that story, there was external conflict. In this story, the conflict is all internal when the android is tempted over and over to push the limits of his experiments to the brink. A masterfully told and thoroughly enjoyable tale.

Cadbury, the Beaver Who Lacked
Cadbury works all day gnawing on trees and is paid in blue poker chips. His wife wants him to work harder and earn white poker chips. He tosses out a message in a bottle and a female beaver responds. He goes to meet her and finds out the grass is not greener.

This story is a wee bit more than sexist. It is really anti-woman. All of the woman are exploitive and manipulative. I’m not a fan of intelligent animal stories and did not find this one exceptional enough to enjoy.

A Little Something for Us Tempunauts
Three time travelers return to their time and earth. Except that it’s not their time. It is about a week in the future – far from their destination of more than 100 years in the future. In reality, they have just died and will attend their own funerals. They are trapped in a time loop that keeps them repeating this same pattern over and over again. They strive to break it.

The mysteries and perils of time travel are oft explored in science fiction. Dick revives an frequently used trope and makes it work nicely.

The Pre-Persons
In a dystopian society where scarcity of resources is a reality, abortion is not just used on the unborn as a means of population control. Parents can now have their children aborted up to the age of 12 when the government has determined they have a soul. Two men and two boys resist.

This is a powerful story and leaves little doubt as to where Philip K. Dick stood on the issue of abortion.

The Eye of the Sibyl
Sybils are people who foretell events and have attachments to past consciences. A man, aptly named Philos Dicktos, simultaneously lives in the time of Julius Caesar and John Kennedy and foretells the assassination of both.

This story is confusing with its parallel narratives and uneasy transitions between those two narratives. The story is obviously inspired by Dick’s “spiritual” experience in 1974 and what one might describe as a breakdown.

The Day Mr. Computer Fell out of its Tree
A lovelorn computer creates a topsy turvy world when it cannot find someone to love. The leaders of the world set out to find a woman who lives in the earth and listens to radio soap operas so that she might show the computer some love.

This represents another attempt by Dick to write light, comical science fiction. I hate it.

The Exit Door Leads In
Bob Bibleman goes out for lunch and ends up “recruited” to go to college. There, while learning about philosophy, he is tested on basic morality, leadership, and initiative.

Dick’s later fiction is much less plot oriented and more philosophy oriented. This particular story was written for a Rolling Stone publication for colleges upon request.

Chains of Air, Web of Aether
A man living on a remote, frozen world reluctantly enters into a relationship with his neighbor who has a horrible disease. He cares for her during her treatment and recovery, all the while denying to himself that he cares about her.

There is a lot of emotion in this story that is not typically found in Dick stories. PKD was a bizarre dude and didn’t really convey a great depth of human feeling in his stories. However, the reader can easily identify with the hero of this story and his mixed emotions.

Strange Memories of Death
A man recounts how his apartment building went condo and one of the tenants – and eccentric old woman – was forced to move out. He did not know her, but thinks about how life must be for her, being forced from the only home she’s known for years.

This is the first entirely non-genre fiction I’ve ever read by Philip K. Dick. I can’t help but feel he wrote it to work out some lingering guilt or other emotions. As such stories go, it was perfectly acceptable. Not my cup of tea.

I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon
A man partially awakens from cryogenic sleep during a ten year space voyage. The ship’s computer, recognizing that the man will go insane if he is not mentally stimulated for ten years, constructs scenarios inside the man’s mind, drawing on memories. The memories awaken old guilts and hurts that destroy any chance of happiness when he finally arrives at his destination.

This was a disturbing story that was exceptionally told. It really lays bare how small, but pivotal deeds in our youth can deeply affect us in our adult life.

Rautavaara’s Case
Space debris strikes a ship and wipes out two members of the three person crew. The third person has her brain revived by aliens who are eager to study human behavior as she hallucinates. Meanwhile, Earth officials protest the abuse of their near-dead astronaut.

Deep religious issues are explored in this short story. How might one religion see the relationship another has with its deity? Also explored are the ethics of keeping alive a brain damaged person.

The Alien Mind
A cruel and heartless astronaut kills his pet cat when the cat sends his ship slightly off course and embarrasses him in front of an alien race. That race makes sure he pays for his cruelty.

It was an interesting topic to approach in a science fiction setting. However, the story itself fell flat with a vanilla ending.

Dangerous Visions 2 Edited by Harlan Ellison

Dangerous Visions 2
Edited by Harlan Ellison
Copyright 1969

New Introduction
After the successful publication of the Dangerous Visions anthology in hardback in 1967, the anthology was broken up into three paperback volumes. In volume 2 of this cycle, Ellison writes a new introduction to describe the impact the anthology has had on the publishing industry and the effect it has had on writing science fiction. He also takes a moment to excerpt a couple letters written to him and to discuss the censorship efforts directed at the anthology.

The Man who Went to the Moon – Twice by Howard Rodman
A little boy caught in a hot air balloon returns to terra firma claiming he has traveled to the moon. He is an instant celebrity and visited by many dignitaries. Decades later, as an old man, he repeats the accomplishment. This time, he is dismissed as an old quack and people care very little for his accomplishment.

Rodman would have us reflect on technological marvels and accomplishments and how they cease to be marvels and become parts of ordinary life with the passage of time. Rodman’s writing has a Twain tone to it in the beginning, then takes on a much more morose tone of perhaps Bierce at the end. A worthwhile entry in Ellison’s groundbreaking anthology.

Faith of Our Fathers by Philip K. Dick
Many years after the Vietnam war, the communists have won and taken over the United States and other parts of the world. A low level party official is provided an opportunity for advancement within the party. But one evening, he takes some snuff provided by a street vendor and has his eyes opened to the nature of his government and its leader.

Philip K. Dick was well known for his use of psychedelics. Here, he explores the oft-reported religious experience many LSD users experience and how it might be useful in discerning the nature of God, the government, and religion. The end of this story left a little to be desired. But, like many Dick stories, leaves you pondering its meaning while providing a worthwhile narrative.

The Jigsaw Man by Larry Niven
A condemned prisoner escapes death row in a society that harvests organs from those executed. He strikes back at society by destroying an organ donation center. When he is captured and tried, the prosecution doesn’t even bother introducing those charges. They have other charges that are easier to convict him on.

Maybe it rang ominous in 1966. Today it’s just shrill and alarmist. One of the few tales in this anthology completely destroyed by the passage of time.

Gonna Roll the Bones by Fritz Leiber
A man enters a casino in Hades to gamble with a demon. They dice for the man’s soul.

I so wanted to like this story because Leiber is a legend and I’ve not read him before. But this story, which Leiber admitted was an oft-told tale, was overwritten with long, run-on sentences and needless alliteration. It would appear many disagree with me since this story won both the Hugo and Nebula Award for best novella.

Lord Randy, My Son by Joe L. Hensley
A middle-aged lawyer deals with day to day life with his mentally challenged (autistic?) son. His son, Randy has the ability to mete out justice to the wicked and conjure kindness from the misunderstood. But all his father can see is the disability.

Autism is not quite the mystery today it was in the 1960s. It may have been quite revolutionary (dangerous) to assign special powers or savant skills to the mentally challenged. Today, it’s an old trope. Nonetheless, Hensley writes an effectively moody story that hits all the right emotional chords to achieve his goal.

Eutopia by Poul Anderson
In an alternative world, a cultural researcher flees a land after seducing the child of its ruler. He is pursued into a neighboring land and the leader of that land agrees to give him refuge and transport him home. When he arrives in his homeland of Eutopia, he complains to his boss of the crude and barbaric behavior of other lands. But it is revealed that our hero has engaged in some of the most verboten behavior himself.

I didn’t see the twist coming and I didn’t see that Anderson provided many clues. His lyrical prose made this story sometimes difficult to read, but he paced it well and with the last sentence demonstrated why this story was indeed a dangerous vision.

Incident in Moderan by David R. Bunch
A war is fought for the sake of war. A cease fire is declared to allow an enemy to repair his weaponry and defenses so that hate of the enemy can continue to feed the war. But the enemy mistakes it as an earnest cease fire to allow them to honor their dead.

The subtext of the futility of war and the need for a propaganda machine to feed hatred of the enemy is not subtle. The story is well paced and just the right length to make it enjoyable without repeatedly ramming the subtext home.

The Escaping by David R. Bunch
A being performs a daily stunt for those who watch him perform. One day, while folding air, he thumbs his nose at his audience and escapes in his space egg.

I just hate when sci-fi becomes literary garbage. That is what this is. David Bunch got two stories in this most famous anthology and the second one a stream of words marching across the page in search of an idea or a plot.

The Doll-House by James Cross
A man and his family are living well beyond their means and robbing Peter to pay Paul, waiting for the inevitable crash. The man appeals to his wife’s uncle who he believes is wealthy. Instead of giving him money, the uncle provides a doll house inhabited by a tiny prognosticator. He uses it to build wealth until it once again comes crashing down around him.

This is a retelling of that timeless classic about the goose who laid the golden eggs. Cross gives the tale just enough twists to make it worth reading. One of the best in the book so far.

Sex and/or Mr. Morrison by Carol Ermshwiller
A petite creature secludes herself in the boarding house room of her obese neighbor and watches him undress, fascinated by human nakedness.

Not as lurid as it sounds, nor as interesting – and not because it is not lurid.

Shall the Dust Praise Thee by Damon Knight
The Christian God comes to Earth to judge mankind and finds that they have annihilated themselves in war. Man’s final plea is etched upon a stone in Britain: “Where were you?”

Difficult prose sometimes concealed what was an interesting story about God written by an atheist.

Book to Movie: The Adjustment Bureau (2011)

Book to Movie: The Adjustment Bureau (2011)
Based on the short story, The Adjustment Team by Philip K. Dick
Screenplay by George Nolfi
Directed by George Nolfi

In 2011, screenwriter George Nolfi made his directorial debut in a “reimagining” of a rather dull Philip K. Dick short story, The Adjustment Team. Nolfi took Dick’s basic premise and turned it into a romantic thriller.

In the short story, Dick’s main character is a businessman who needs to be delayed for just a couple minutes in his arrival at work so the rest of the team can complete a major adjustment at his place of employment. The adjuster misses his appointment and the man walks in on the team doing the adjustment.

In Nolfi’s version of the story, the main character is New York congressman David Norris (played by Matt Damon), who is running for the U.S. Senate in 2006. Unfortunately for Norris, a picture of him mooning his college reunion surfaces and causes him to lose. While in a men’s room on election night, going over his concession speech, he meets Elise Sellas (played by Emily Blunt), a professional dancer. He is immediately smitten with her. The problem is, they were never supposed to meet.

In comes the Adjustment Bureau. They are going to prevent another meeting. But, the adjuster assigned to Norris misses his appointment and Norris walks in on an adjustment underway in his office where time is frozen. He is taken aside by one of the adjusters and their mission of keeping the cosmos in order and on-plan is explained to him. He is also told that he is destined not to see Sellas ever again.

Norris is not deterred and continues to pursue Sellas even though he does not know her last name or anything else about her. After riding the same bus to work for three years, Norris finally finds her and they renew their budding relationship.

However, Norris is told that he will never realize his political dreams if he stays with Sellas. He is also told that her dreams of fame as a dancer will never be realized. Despite his love for her, Norris leaves her at a hospital where she is being treated for a sprained ankle.

Three years pass without Norris seeing her. He learns that she is about to be married to a man she doesn’t love and he decides to take fate and destiny into his own hands. He finds her at the courthouse where she is about to be married and professes his love for her. They run off together, aided by a magical hat (it’s not nearly as dumb as it sounds) provided by a sympathetic adjuster. The adjusters pursue them through the various doorways in New York City that the bureau uses to move around quickly.

Finally, the pair is cornered on the roof of the Adjustment Bureau’s building. They are about to be permanently adjusted to forget each other when the sympathetic adjustor shows up with a decree from the Chairman of the Adjustment Bureau – the man who makes the plans for the cosmos. He tells them the plan has been adjusted and Norris and Sellas can live together happily ever after.

Dick’s story was pure fantasy. Nolfi’s version was a love story. Granted, Dick’s story was a short story authored for a pulp science fiction magazine that mainly appealed to pre-teen and teen males. Still, there was not much to like in the story and it was dull. Although I’m not a fan of romance movies, I have to say I like Nolfi’s story much better.

Matt Damon (one of the great actors of our generation) again rises to the occasion and delivers a fantastic performance. He is believable as the politician who has lost interest and is mailing in his speeches. His chemistry with Blunt is superb. Nolfi’s script and directing gave us a story that was romantic, but not sticky sweet.

I would also give kudos to Nolfi for all but rejecting CGI effects. There were none detectable in this movie. It would have been easy to turn Norris and Sellas’ chase through New York City into CGI eye candy. Instead, Nolfi opted for simple foot chases. Nor were there any dramatic car chases that a ham-handed director could have inserted into this script. Nolfi shows he has an eye for what works on the big screen without cheapening his product.

When one looks at movies (and now television with the broadcast premiere of The Man in the High Castle on Amazon) based on Dick’s work, it would seem that Hollywood likes Dick’s premises, but not his stories. Blade Runner, Total Recall, Minority Report, Paycheck, and The Adjustment Bureau all contain the basis of Dick’s story, but deviate far from Dick’s prose.

The result has been very good as opposed to someone like Stephen King and Ray Bradbury who have seen their work “reimagined” badly. Some very good sci-fi has been made using original concepts develop by Philip K. Dick decades ago. While The Adjustment Bureau is never going to rank with Blade Runner or Minority Report in the pantheon of great science fiction and/or fantasy, it is a worthwhile addition to Dick’s Hollywood credits.

Second Variety and Other Stories By Philip K. Dick

Second Variety and Other Stories
By Philip K. Dick
Copyright 1989

Introduction by Norman Spinrad
Science fiction novelist and screenwriter Norman Spinrad discusses the early short story work of Philip K. Dick published in this volume. He points out that, when Dick began writing, science fiction authors had to go through an apprenticeship that consisted of writing short stories for the pulps. Success in the pulps did not always translate into novel success, but Dick’s best medium was the novel. He discusses Dick’s use of multiple point of view characters and how he perfected this type of storytelling.

The Cookie Lady
Bernard “Bubber” Surle, a young boy, has taken to visiting Mrs. Drew on a regular basis. Mrs. Drew is an elderly lady who bakes cookies for young Bubber. Every time Bubber leaves Mrs. Drew’s house, he’s really tired. His parents, seeing his physical distress, forbid him from returning. But Bubber heads back for one last visit.

It’s a riff on the old “witch lures the kiddies with cookies” motif. What is different is the lack of evil or malice in the witch character. She simply notices that sitting close to the boy makes her younger. Both characters are devoid of emotion, which makes this story rather sterile.

Beyond the Door
Larry Thomas buys his wife, Doris, a magical cuckoo clock that talks to her. She develops a special relationship with the little bird in side while the bird comes to dislike Larry. One day, Larry comes home and finds his neighbor, Bob, with his wife. He tosses them both out, but keeps the clock. Larry doesn’t like the clock and the clock doesn’t like him. Things come to a head.

The story probably worked well in the 1950s and is not without its charm. But the ending was entirely predictable and not terribly exciting. But, we are seeing an author who is still learning the craft.

Second Variety
In a post-apocalyptic world where robots are the instruments of terror, a UN soldier receives a message from the Soviets that they want to talk truce. He travels to the Soviet base to find out it’s been wiped out by robots. He meets three people who remain from the Soviet base. They tell him that they’ve identified the first variety of robots and third variety of robots. But the dangerous second variety has not yet been identified.

This was a fantastic, hard science fiction story about war and conflict. It’s an often used trope, found in stories such as Who Goes There and Invasion of the Body Snatchers. There’s really nothing new here. But it is good writing and a good story.

Jon’s World
Ryan is preparing to accompany a businessman in a time traveling ship to go into the past to find the man who developed the robots that fought the war and destroyed the earth. Ryan’s son, Jon, has frequent seizures where he has visions. He tells his father that his visions are of people walking in fields, talking about the problems of the universe. Ryan and his partner travel back in time to find their scientist. They steal his papers, but accidentally kill him. They return to their time to find out they changed history for the better.

This story was a sequel to Second Variety and was just as good. Second Variety was quite action oriented. Jon’s World is much more contemplative in its examination of the butterfly effect.

The Cosmic Poachers
A Terran ship encounters an alien freighter in a restricted system. The Terrans observe the insectile race leaving their ship and extracting something from the soil. The Terrans surprise the insect race and board their ship. There, they find beautiful, seemingly priceless jewels. But the insects, they are something else entirely.

This one was written at a more elementary level than most Philip K. Dick stories. The Cosmic Poachers was first published in Imagination in July 1953.

Progeny
A man and a woman give up their son at birth so that he might be trained by emotionally detached robots to achieve his full potential. Eighteen years later, the father goes to meet his son for the first time and find out if there is any part of him left in his son.

There’s a tiny bit of poignancy in this story, but I wasn’t sure what it was trying to be. If it was trying for hard sci-fi, there wasn’t much there. If it was going for poignancy, it fell short of that mark as well.

Some Kinds of Life
Earth is at war with various planets and moons in the galaxy for natural resources. The government continues to expand the war and open new fronts, creating the need for new recruits to seize the materials they need to continue their comfortable way of life.

The allegory here was not subtle. The war for natural resources that power the devices of convenience in society might not be worth the war when nobody is left to enjoy those conveniences.

Martians Come in Clouds
A father is badly frightened when a he encounters a Martian stuck in a tree on his way home from work. But his son learns the real reason why Martians make their always ill-fated journey to Earth.

This one had the flavor of 1950s sci-fi. It reminded very much of the move FIDO with the father who had all of the phobias and the son discovering the real nature of zombies. Of course, Dick had a much deeper emotion than did the comedy movie.

The Commuter
A man walks into a train station and asks for a ticket to a destination that does not exist. After demanding the ticket insisting that the town does exist, the man disappears into thin air. After the ticket seller sees the phenomenon a second time, he goes in search of this mysterious town.

Perhaps a commentary on urban sprawl. If so, it missed its mark. Not a particularly interesting story.

The World She Wanted
A woman approaches a man at a bar and tells him he is for her in this world that is made just for her. The man starts to become convinced of her take on reality as more and more of what she commands from the cosmos comes to her.

I looked hard for some social commentary here, but did not find it. It was an intriguing and interesting story with a not unexpected ending. Stories like this served as inspiration for Twilight Zone episodes.

A Surface Raid
An advanced race has retreated underground to live in caverns under mountains while humans – or “saps” – have stayed on the surface following two world wars. The advanced creatures from below the earth come to the surface to take saps for their factories below.

This story is reminiscent – but not derivative – of The Time Machine. The post-humanism that would later be featured in stories like Planet of the Apes is on display here in magnificent splendor. This story is Dick at his finest.

Project: Earth
A young boy discovers that a man in a nearby apartment is raising tiny, humanoid beings that will eventually replace man on earth. The kid steals them and keeps them as playthings.

I loved this story and it is a great example of the kinds of soft sci-fi that one could find in the pulps of the 1950s.

Project: Earth first appeared in Imagination Magazine in 1953

The Trouble with Bubbles
In a time distant in the future, man has found no other life forms in the galaxy. To meet the longing of humans to connect with other life forms, a company creates Worldcraft – a do it yourself world creation kit. While attending the judging of a Worldcraft contest, a lawmaker decides to write laws to ban the practice, fearing that man has become cruel in his new found god-like powers over the worlds they create. On his way home, he encounters the work of the God that controls catastrophes in our world.

Dick demonstrates again that pulp writer’s ability to craft well-honed plots that keep the reader guessing and the narrative moving at a satisfying pace. There was everything to like about this story.

The Trouble with Bubbles first appeared in IF Magazine in 1953.

Breakfast at Twilight
A family wakes up in the morning to find that they and their home have been transported forward in time to 1980 when the Earth is in ashes and troops scour the land in search of food, supplies, and humans to feed the war machine.

Obviously, this story reveals Dick’s hatred and fear of war. The most ominous and indicative line: “The war didn’t start. It grew.” It has, however, an optimistic ending which is not characteristic of a Philip K. Dick story.

A Present for Pat
Eric Blake brings home a god from Ganymede for his wife for a present. When the god starts employing his powers to smite those who annoy him, trouble ensues for Eric with his employer and with the law.

This one has the writing stylings of 1950s comedy. The wife is shrill and hysterical. Her husband meek, mild, but well meaning. His boss is a tyrant. His best friend is obnoxious. Dick makes it work to some degree. But an awful lot of clichés are working here.

The Hood Maker
In a dystopian New York City, a man is beset by a mob because he is wearing a hood – a concealed device that screens his thoughts from scanning by telepaths known as “teeps” who make sure all of its citizens are loyal and without impure thought. Franklin escapes the mob with a young woman who asks him to use his influence with a Senator to stop a bill that would halt free thought and codify the legality of the teeps’ actions. The government pursues them to stop them.

This one had a great premise, but it was not well executed. The twist was not well written and did not have much surprise value. The end was more than a bit limp, leaving the reader to wonder, so what?

Of Withered Apples
A single apple tree leaf blows in the window of a young wife’s home and the withering tree beckons to her. She heads out into the night to find the abandoned farm where the dying tree stands to meet her destiny.

This tale succeeds at being atmospheric. This is something many pulp writers never strived for, preferring to keep their readers riveted with action. Dick shows he’s got the chops of a horror writer similar to Hawthorne and Poe here. A beautiful tale.

Human Is
A woman endures a loveless marriage to a driven, determined scientist who is cruel and uncaring. He travels to the ruins on Rexor IV and comes back a different man – caring, considerate and wanting to spend time with her in lieu of work. When the government finds out that his body has been taken over by a resident of Rexor IV, they need her testimony to exterminate him.

This story is nothing special except it has more feeling than the average Dick story. What is interesting about reading Philip K. Dick short stories versus his novels is that he conveys much more human emotion in his short stories than he does in his plot driven novels.

Human Is was originally published in Startling Stories, Winter 1955.

Adjustment Team
An “adjustment team” that keeps the cosmos in line for human existence to continue, misses an important deadline regarding a real estate salesman. The salesman goes to work, not knowing that he’s stumbling into reality put on hold for adjustment. He soon learns the nature of the adjustment team and their reason for adjustment.

I found this story unremarkable. Perhaps the premise was new in the 1950s, but by today’s standards, it was lackluster. The stated purpose of adjustment was pie in the sky, utopian nonsense.

The Adjustment Team first appeared in Orbit Science Fiction, Fall 1954. In 2011, it was made into a movie titled The Adjustment Bureau that starred Matt Damon.

The Impossible Planet
An ancient woman asks a ship’s captain for one final request before she dies, having ended her life extension treatments. She wants to see earth. The captain insists that the planet earth is nothing but a myth and does not exist. The lady’s robot servant locates earth and the captain takes her there to see the wellspring of humanity and learn its ultimate fate.

This story is full of fatalism that was outside the norm of 1950s sci-fi and more typical of late 1960s. Creepy and eerie, Dick makes this atmospheric tale work with just enough plot to keep it moving.

Impossible Planet was first published in Imagination in October 1953.

Imposter
A man working as a weapons researcher is arrested as an outworld spy. Agents claim that a robot was sent by outworlders to kill him and take his place. Inside this robot was a bomb, triggered by a secret word or phrase. Desperate to prove his innocence, the man escapes and returns home to convince his friends and family he is who he says he is.

This might be the best story in the collection. Seldom has Dick composed prose that move a story at such a fast pace. When you’re reading Philip K. Dick, you know a twist is coming. I knew the twist was coming – there always is in stories involving replicants. I even had a suspicion as to what it was. But Dick’s writing made me want to get there fast.

James P. Crow
Many years after man wiped out his own society, he is a second class citizen to robots. Robots design their society to keep humans in their place. But one man has a plan to change all that and he is the stuff of legend among his own kind and a credit to his race.

The metaphor was entirely too in your face in this story, although perhaps it was more biting in the 1950s. But the story’s sci-fi angle does work and overcomes Dick’s ham-handed social activism.

Planet for Transients
Three hundred and fifty years ago, the Earth was ravaged by atomic war. Now, men live underground in mines. Trent, an explorer searching New York for other human settlements encounters the new sentient creatures that inhabit the surface, now covered in lush vegetation. He learns of a human settlement to the north. When he gets there, he learns a lesson about the nature of the cosmos.

There was no subtext or underlying message here. This story was just fun with a little bit of philosophy tacked on the end.

Planet for Transients first appeared in Fall issue of Fantastic Universe.

Small Town
An oppressed clerical worker becomes obsessed with his model train and the model town he has built up around it in his basement. He quits his job and begins to take out his wrath on those who spited him by remodeling his little town. Meanwhile, his doctor and his wife – who are having an affair – are horrified.

The trope here is so old it must have been worn out in 1953. The resolution was ambiguous and the characters lacked development. One of the weaker elements in this collection.

Souvenir
The legendary Williamson’s Planet is located. Founded by the first interstellar space traveler, terraformer, and pioneer, the planet was thought by many to be a myth. Upon arriving, Astronaut Rogers is disappointed to find a primitive, agrarian culture with a warlike disposition, communistic economy, and tribal government. He tries to convince them to join the interstellar government that promotes homogeneous cultural, social, and technological development.

This story was rather dull. The social commentary – such as it was – didn’t say much. The plot was boring and the characters drab.

Survey Team
Earth is a planet caught in the decay following atomic war. A survey team is dispatched to Mars to ascertain whether or not it is habitable. The survey team arrives to find a planet of crumbling cities and soil stripped of all that is valuable. The Martians’ records indicate that they found another planet they could inhabit – a virgin planet untouched by pollution or depletion. The earthmen decide to learn its location and head there and take it from the Martians if they have to.

This is the kind of sci-fi is the reason I read sci-fi. As I read this story, I could hear it as a Dimension X or X Minus 1 radio show. It had the drama and the properly timed plot twist that these shows incorporated.

Prominent Author
A bureaucrat at a research and development plant is given a prototype transporter that transports him between his home and work which is 160 miles away in New York City in just a matter of seconds. One day, while in the transporter, he encounters a group of tiny people who hold him in awe. They have questions and they want answers. He is only more than happy to oblige them. He is surprised when he finds out his tiny worshippers have published a book with his answers.

This wasn’t as clever as it sounds. It could have been. But Dick fumbled the climax and resolution.

The Man in the High Castle By Philip K. Dick

The Man in the High Castle
By Philip K. Dick
Copyright 1962

The Man in the High Castle is a Hugo Award winning, alternative history novella by Philip K. Dick – a master of science fiction and alternative reality. This book explores the consequences of the Allies losing World War II and the takeover of the United States by the Nazis and the Japanese.

In Dick’s alternative history, President Franklin D. Roosevelt is felled by an assassin’s bullet in 1934, allowing vice president John Nance Garner to rise to the presidency. Garner’s weak government is followed by the election of Ohio senator John W. Bricker to the presidency. An ardent isolationist, Bricker delays American entry into World War II and the Axis become too strong to defeat. The Allies are defeated. Germany continues its extermination of the Jews and Japan takes over the American economy.

Japanese and German governments have an uneasy coexistence in the United States until the death of German Chancellor, Martin Bormann. Maneuvering takes place within the Nazi government to succeed Bormann and the Japanese are eager to take advantage of the power vacuum. Unfortunately, the readers are never allowed to glimpse these intrigues.

Instead, the reader learns of the lives of Japanese and German government officials living in the United States – far removed from the bastions of power. Also included in the story are various American citizens who sell American heirlooms – cherished by the Japanese, his ex wife who is a bohemian yoga instructor, a manufacturer of counterfeit American heirlooms and his business partner.


Frank Frink lives in the former U.S. disguising his Jewish heritage. After throwing a temper tantrum one day at work, he loses his job at Wyndham-Matson – a manufacturer of fake Americana. Frink sets up a fake antique jewelry manufacturing operation with his business partner, Ed McCarthy. They sell their products to Robert Childan who has several high ranking Japanese as his customers.

Frink’s ex-wife, Julianne, falls for an Italian truck driver. As do many of the characters in the novel, she is exposed to the book The Grasshopper Lies Heavy. This book is an alternative history set within Dick’s alternative history. In the book within a book, Franklin Roosevelt decides not to run after two terms and is succeeded in office by socialist economist, Rexford Tugwell. Tugwell successfully leads the country into war mobilization and defeats the Axis powers. The book is considered seditious by the Nazi and Japanese governments. Julianne is determined to join her new lover in meeting the author, Hawthorne Abendsen.

Meanwhile, Mr. Baynes travels from Europe to California to meet with Japanese trade minister Tagomi to inform him of a plot to drop a hydrogen bomb on the Japanese home islands. Joseph Goebbels's faction of the party is planning this attack as Goebbels tries to fill the Nazi power vacuum.

These two plotlines unfold until the Japanese thwart the German plan and Julianne meets Abendsen and gets him to reveal the true nature of his book.

I like Philip K. Dick a lot and this book has received much acclaim. However, I did not like it very much.

The book was terribly fragmented with many disparate plotlines running at the same time. This can be an effective story telling device as Stephen King proved in The Stand and Dean Koontz proved in Strangers. The characters in these separate plotlines need never meet or interact with each other. But the subplots should eventually coalesce into one main plot driving toward a climax. The Man in the High Castle never arrived at this singular climax.

The weak storytelling is not offset by strong characters. We get to know them some through their inner dialogue – particularly Julianne. But, typical of Dick and others of the pulp era, the characters are fleshed out only enough to make them function in the story.

The two plots would have made for two great, separate novels. Or, The Man in the High Castle would have been a good book if Dick would have found a way to link the two story lines. They had not even tangential relationship to one another.

I did enjoy Dick’s take on historical figures such as John Nance Garner, John Bricker, and Rexford Tugwell. Garner’s name is lost on almost everyone except historians. Bricker enjoyed some fame in the 1940s as Dewey’s running mate in 1944. Tugwell’s name and politics are quite obscure. Dick does not dwell on these men much, but he does represent them accurately and uses their legacies effectively.

Through these figures, Dick examines the history of the lead up to American involvement in World War II and how America almost blew it. Bricker and Garner were both isolationists – as were most people in the United States at that time. In Dick’s tale, the isolationists prevailed and kept America out of World War II until it was too late. In his book within a book, Tugwell moves the Pacific fleet out of Pearl Harbor and preserves it, allowing America much greater strength in that theater.

It is clear that the pacifist Dick believes World War II was a good war and the men who fought it were good men while those who opposed it were incompetent. This is a view shared by most historians, pacifist or not.

Dick also explores the nature of reality. What is real in our existence might not be the real reality as we learn when the source of book within a book is revealed. Many writers would have endeavored to explain this twist on reality. Dick effectively leaves it there for the reader to ponder.

This book is a must read for fans of pulp science fiction. The book and its writer are legendary. Go into it with eyes wide open. If you are looking for hard sci-fi like Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, you are not going to find it here. The Man in the High Castle is an alternative history that studies the effects of what could have been. There are very few sci-fi elements to be found.

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep By Philip K. Dick

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep
By Philip K. Dick
Copyright 1968

It is a common refrain among active readers that the book is always better than the movie. Most of the time, this is true. The written word allows the active exploration of moods, emotions, and motivation. Reading is an active engagement. Movies, on the other hand, are passive. You sit and the action unfolds before your eyes.

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep and the movie based upon it, Blade Runner, are an exception to this. The short novel is a linear story with little character development based primarily on action. The move, however, is a dark, moody affair, bringing to life a bleak dystopia that is the 21st century where men hunt androids and androids are dangerous.

The book opens in the home of Rick Deckard, a bounty hunter who “retires” androids who escape the Martian colony where they function in servitude. The earth is a bleak wasteland following the last world war and the government is encouraging people to move to the new Martian colony. Many sections of Deckards hometown of San Francisco are abandoned.

On the roof of his apartment building, Deckard cares for an android ewe. In the postwar world, all life is valued since so much of it has been destroyed. Those with status own real animals which are quite expensive. Deckard can only afford an artificial animal, but longs for the real thing.

Deckard and his wife are fighting and she plugs into a mood altering device that links her to the world's leading religious figure, Mercer, to distract herself. He receives a call from a local police agency from who he frequently receives cases. The regular bouny hunter for the northern California district has been wounded by an android he was trying to retire. They need Deckard to hunt down and destroy six Nexus-6 androids. Deckard accepts the case.

Meanwhile, in an all but abandoned apartment building in San Francisco, Rick Isidore leads the droning existence of a man with a low IQ. He is intrigued when, out of nowhere, a woman moves into one of the many vacant apartments in his building. He introduces herself to her and they become acquaintances.

Deckard travels to Seattle where he meets with the head of the Rosen Corporation that manufactures the Nexus-6. He administers an empathy test that is used to determine whether or not a being an android to Rosen’s niece, Rachael. Deckard suspects Rachael is an android and his suspicions are confirmed when she tries to bribe him into abandoning his assignment with the gift of a real owl.

Deckard retires the first two Nexus-6 androids he finds with little difficulty. With some cash in his pocket, Deckard buys a real goat to keep on his roof.

When Deckard retires his third Nexus-6, he has an attack of conscience and begins to doubt his own humanity. He wonders if he, in fact, has any empathy in him when he is able to dispatch his targets with such dispassion. His doubt deepens when he is arrested and forced to escape from a police station staffed entirely by androids. He escapes with the assistance of a fellow bounty hunter who he suspects is an android.

Meanwhile, the three remaining androids have gathered at the apartment building where Rick Isidore lives. They con him into helping them hide from Deckard who is closing in. When Deckard arrives at the building, he finds Rachael there. With his doubts of his own humanity in his head, he makes love with and professes his love for Rachael.

Rachael reciprocates by telling Deckard that she has slept with many bounty hunters to dissuade them from killing androids. Angry at her and at himself, he tells Rachael to go home. She leaves and he resumes his hunt.

Deckard eventually finds the androids holed up in Isidore’s apartment. He dispatches them with little difficulty and leaves. He flees north to Oregon to meditate. There, he finds a toad. Toads are thought to be extinct and are held in high esteem by the postwar’s leading religious figure, Mercer. He discovers that Mercer is simply a drunk in a makeshift television studio in Indiana. He also learns that the world’s leading television host is an android.

He returns home to his wife, beguiled by the toad and convinced of his own humanity. His wife tells him that Rachael has paid them a visit and pushed their goat off of the roof, killing it. The book ends with Deckard’s wife discovering that the toad is artificial.

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep was selected by my book club. The theme was “a book that was inferior to the movie.” We watched Blade Runner after discussing the book and we unanimously agreed the movie was superior.

The book, despite its linear plot, was an exploration of what it is to be a human being. Is empathy an essential requirement of humanity? Can machines ever feel empathy? The obvious answer to the second question is no, not as technology exists. If we are to believe that our humanity rests within a soul, then machines will never acquire empathy.

The answer to the first question is much more difficult and the essence of Dick’s challenge to the reader. As we discussed the book, I related it to a real world incident where it would seem that a human being voluntarily divested himself of humanity.

In his defense of his conduct during the My Lai massacre, Lt. William Calley described how the military had taught him that the enemy was not human. It was a being to be destroyed with dispassion. If one reads an account of what Calley and his men did to the people of My Lai, it is apparent that he took that lesson to heart. Did Calley ever possess empathy for his fellow man, only later to have the military drive it from him? Only William Calley knows.

The other real life event that I related to this book was the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing in 1963. Four young girls were killed when members of the Ku Klux Klan bombed the church. I recall, as a youngster, seeing an interview with an Alabaman Klansman who said, “When I find a nest of rattlesnakes, I don’t just kill the momma. I kill the babies too.” Obviously this man was devoid of human empathy.

Philip K. Dick, like so many of the science fiction writers held in high esteem today started out writing for the pulp magazines in the 1930s and 1940s. Pulp writers tend to tell fast paced stories with linear plots. That was what editors demanded and readers wanted. When one reads the works of Richard Matheson, Ray Bradbury, and Philip K. Dick, this is what one finds. Sometimes, the story suffers for it.

The chief criticism of this book was what wasn’t there. There was little character development an absolutely no subplots. The battle scenes which should have generated excitement, were rather anticlimactic and disposed of quickly, reminiscent of Edgar Rice Burroughs. Although Dick tells us there is a meaningful relationship between man and nature after mother nature is nearly destroyed, he did little to explore this relationship.

I’ve not read a lot of Philip K. Dick and this is the first novel I’ve read by him. I’ve been told it is not one of his best. I hope not. While Blade Runner is a visually stunning, exciting chase movie with great battle scenes and an interesting plot twist at the end. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep leaves the reader longing for excitement and just a little puzzled by its ending. But the introspection it generates makes it a worthwhile read.

Book to Movie: Paycheck (2003)

Book to Movie: Paycheck (2003)
Screenplay by Dean Georgaris
Directed by John Woo
Based on the short story, Paycheck by Philip K. Dick

Reading Philip K. Dick’s short fiction, it is easy to ascertain why so many movies are made based on his work. Most contain plenty of action, lots of plot, and contain a moral. While his short story, Paycheck, first published in 1953, lacks any overall moralistic message, it has action, plot, and a puzzle of sorts which gives it all it needs to succeed as a movie.

Dick’s story starts with engineer Jennings (Ben Affleck) returning from the mission in question. In the movie, we are given an introduction to Jennings and his technique of undertaking technical espionage missions and then having his memory erased. The movie opens with him returning from a mission where he steals holographic technology for personal computer monitors, making his sponsor quite rich.

His billionaire buddy, Rethrick recruits him again – this time for a two year hitch. The payout will be in the eight figure range. Jennings agrees and is injected with a chemical that will allow him to conduct his business without remembering.

Jennings is revived and has no memory of what he’s done. He goes home to find that he’s made $90 million. When he goes to claim it, it’s gone. When he goes to claim his personal possessions he deposited with the company two years prior, he is given a decidedly different set of possessions.

The story falls back in line with Dick’s version here. The possessions include a pack of cigarettes, a can of hair spray, a book of matches and sundry other items. He takes his stuff and leaves the bank. He is immediately taken into custody by the FBI. They tell him that his name appears on several patents related to a decommissioned government product. The technology has gone missing.

The subject him to electronic interrogation, but his memory has been erased. He escapes the FBI using some of the materials in his envelope that contained his possessions. He flees, but becomes the target of the corporation for whom he worked. They fear he’s talking to the feds and want him dead.

He is able to find his girlfriend of the past two years and meet up with her at a local restaurant where agents from the company make another assassination attempt. She helps him escape and they dig deeper into Jennings’s activities for the last two years. He finds that he was working with lasers and lenses to develop technology that allows the user to see into the future. The government sees it as dangerous and the corporation sees it as profitable.

Meanwhile, the corporation is struggling to recover the records of Jennings’s research. Before he left their employ, he looked into the future and saw the havoc brought about by his invention. So, he sabotaged the computer and packed the items he would need to come back and destroy it in the near future.

Eventually, all forces converge at the Alltech Corporation’s headquarters. Alltech’s people, including its billionaire owner shoot it out with the G-men while Jennings and his girlfriend try to destroy the computer. The computer is destroyed in an explosion that takes out the Alltech Corporation. Jennings and his girlfriend escape, but are listed as being among the dead by the FBI who hopes he’ll just disappear.

The movie ends with Jennings’s and his girlfriend (Uma Thurman) operating a greenhouse and nursery. In the twist, Jennings finds one last item left from his envelope of possessions. That item makes him a millionaire.

Paycheck was an average movie. It was better than I thought it was going to be based on critics’ reviews that called it lackluster with uninspired acting and directing.

The acting is okay. Multiple chase scenes often felt like filler material.

It’s certainly not Ben Affleck’s finest performance. Affleck was the weakest performer in the movie. But Tarantino’s goddess, Uma Thurman makes up for Affleck by carrying the action.

Those who complain that the movie does not do the story justice are not being fair. Dick’s hero was motivated by money. Jennings was motivated by a desire to save mankind. So while there may have been a different theme to the movie, the movie’s theme was nobler than was Dick’s. I think Dick would have been okay with it.

The problem with Paycheck is it relies on the standard formula for chase movies. It has the requisite Mexican standoffs, car chases, and explosions. The twist with the postage stamps that reveals Jennings’s real motives is clever, but not nearly clever enough to lift this film above being simply average.

The Short Happy Life of a Brown Oxford: The Collected Works of Philip K. Dick, Vol. 1

The Short Happy Life of a Brown Oxford
The Collected Works of Philip K. Dick, Vol. 1
By Philip K. Dick
Copyright 1987

Excerpt from a letter to John Bettancourt
In a letter to up and coming science fiction writer, John Betancourt, Philip K. Dick describes what science fiction is and what it isn’t. A story that contains nothing but action in a futuristic or alien setting is not sci-fi, according to Dick. The story must contain a new idea, a new zeitgeist, or new circumstances that impact the story. This is how Dick defines science fiction.

Foreword by Steven Owen Godersky
Godersky notes that Philip K. Dick is viewed as the most serious of the sci-fi writers and there is a growing amount of scholarly criticism of Dick’s work – evidence that Dick and sci-fi is gaining traction in the intellectual world.

Godersky goes on to identify three major themes in ever Dick novel or short story. He writes about small people in large events and lets big ideas play out in small settings. He asks, “What Divides humanity from the intricacies of its creations?” The final theme is a fear and hatred of war. All of Dick’s heroes “share their humanity in their rejection of warfare and aggression.

Introduction by Roger Zelazny
Roger Zelazny collaborated with Philip K. Dick on the book, Deus Irae and came to know him. Zelazny find him to be a charming man with a dry wit that was evidenced in his work. Zelazny was confused by Dick’s late life obsession with mysticism because it was so difficult to tell if Dick was entirely serious or not.

Stability
In a dystopian future where social stability is the predominant zeitgeist, Robert Benton is summoned to a patent office to learn that an invention he submitted had been rejected because of its potential to destabilize society. The problem for Benton is, he has no recollection of having invented anything – let alone submitting it for a patent. But Benton learns that time is a tricky thing and there are tricky things in time.

I’m relatively new to Philip K. Dick. I hope I find most of his stories this delightful to read. Simple prose, a well paced, intricate plot and well developed characters can be found in this short story. Seldom does one read such a short story that achieves all this. Stability was written in 1947, but was not published until 1987 with this compilation of Dick works.

Roog
A dog observes as carnivorous space aliens rob from his family’s garbage on a nightly basis. He tries to warn his family, exclaiming “ROOG!” over and over again. The family is unable to understand him or understand his sudden anxiety at night.

This was Philip K. Dick’s first sold story. Remarkable since it wasn’t very good. Never did I feel that anybody was at risk or that there was something larger happening. Dick says in an interview that he was trying to write from how an unintelligent dog might view the regular arrival of garbage men. It was just a story about rodent aliens. Roog was first published in the Magazine of Science Fiction in November, 1953.

The Little Movement
Toy soldiers plot to take over the world. They use mental domination to overpower the minds of humans to aid in their plot. But other toys have their own ideas and raise a resistance.

This story would serve as a wonderful little “horror” tale for children. The plot is simple, yet interesting and the language is simple as well. It’s fun, but not too terribly engrossing for the adult mind. It was first published in the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction in 1952.

Beyond Lies the Wub
A freighter captain finds himself in possession of a pig as he leaves Mars with a load of freight. Only this isn’t an average pig. This is a wub. The captain has visions of a feast of ham, porkchops, and bacon for him and his crew. The wub would like to discuss the arts and literature. The crew tries to discourage the captain from dining on an intelligent, but bacon has such a strong allure. . .

Again, good sci-fi for the kiddies, but it was an exceptionally light read for adults. Beyond Lies the Wub was first published in Planet Stories, July 1952.


The Gun
A space ship flies by a remote planet and is attacked from the planet surface. The attack damages the ship and forces them to land. While repairs are effected, the crew explores the area and finds a city which contains the gun that shot them down. Under that gun, they find a vault that holds pictures and documents from the lost people of this planet. They disable the gun so that a return expedition can come back and conduct a full study without fear of being attacked. However, as soon as they leave, an automated system kicks in and repairs the gun, arming it with even more powerful weapons.

This was a straightforward story with little, if any subtext. The language and plot are simple that one again gets the impression that Dick is writing for a young audience. The Gun was originally published in Planet Stories, September 1952.


The Skull
Many hundreds of years in the future, the earth is a peaceful place, thanks to the teachings of a twentieth century seer who led a world peace movement that eliminated war. Certain interests in the future want war restored, so they hire a convict to go back in time to kill the man before he can start his movement. They give him the skull of the seer, preserved in the church dedicated to his teachings. The convict goes back in time and find the man who will lead this peace movement. As he prepares to speak, the convict is shocked to find out who the leader of world peace really is.

Despite a little vagueness in the climax, this was a solid sci-fi story for a more intellectually developed audience than the earlier works in this book. The Skull was first published in If magazine in 1952.


The Defenders
World War is underway on the surface of earth. While robots fight the war against the Soviets, people have fled underground where they live and construct war materiel to be shipped to the surface. One day, some curious scientists and military men venture to the surface to have a look for themselves as to what is going on. They find out that there hasn’t been a war and the robots have been protecting them from themselves.

Most anti-war propaganda is thinly veiled or veiled not at all. While Dick made no bones about his opposition to war, he did find a quite clever way to demonstrate it in the writing of this story. Governments make war. People left to their own devices will usually unite. This story was adapted for the radio show X Minus One and was first published in Galaxy Science Fiction, January 1953.


Mr. Spaceship
The people of earth are at war with a race from another star system called the Yuk. The Yuk use biological organisms rather than mechanical to fight their war. To counter this, the people of earth develop a ship to be piloted by a human brain. The leader of the project chooses an old professor to donate his brain to the cause. The project’s leader and his wife are on the shakedown run for the ship with the professor’s brain installed. When it goes out of control as the professor imposes its will on it, the couple and the entire crew are forced to abandon ship and it is lost. However, it returns many years later to kidnap the man and his wife so they can be transported away to a new planet to seed a new human race that will be free of war.

It’s clear that anti-war stances are prevalent in Dick’s writing as Mr. Godersky told us in his introduction. This was a perfectly paced short story with plenty of action to keep the reader engaged and excellent character development. Mr. Spaceship was originally published in Imagination magazine in 1953.

Piper in the Woods
A psychologist examines a patient who has just returned from a very important earth outpost on an asteroid. The patient believes he is now a plant. His spends his days inside, asleep and his days outside basking in the sun. Soon, others on the asteroid are afflicted. Those afflicted say they were led to their new life by a people called The Pipers. The psychologist explores the woods near the military base and finds the asteroid’s indigenous people – and a new way of life.

The end was predictable enough and the characters were not developed well. Nonetheless, it was an enjoyable story with a solid, working plot that was well paced and not overly long. Piper in the Woods was first published in Imagination magazine in 1953.

The Infinites
A small scouting ship encounters an asteroid with an atmosphere and other conditions exactly matching earth, but upon which there is no life. They release hamsters onto the asteroid to test it. They are then hit with a blast of radiation that knocks them unconscious for two days. At first, the crew shows no ill effects. Then, they start changing dramatically with the loss of fingernails, the loss of hair, enlargement of the head. They soon discover that they are evolving into a new, superior race of human. One crewman is eager to return to earth so they can lead it. The captain is not so eager to impose the will of their newfound intellectual superiority on the people of earth. The two struggle for power and for the destiny of man on earth.

This story was rather dull. Not much action or movement. Lots of contemplation and the plot is entirely dialogue driven. More character development might have helped drive the conflict between the captain and his first mate, but there was little, if any, character development. The Infinites was first published in Planet Stories, May of 1953.

The Preserving Machine
A scientist, fearing that all the world’s beautiful music would be lost to the ages in the event of mankind’s demise, works with a university to transform various composers’ bodies of work into living creatures. The machine turns each composer’s work into a different animal which the scientist releases into the woods behind his home. He and a friend venture into the woods one day and find that he has created a new ecosystem where there are predators and prey and where animals evolve in a less than beautiful way in order to survive.

I know that Dick was going for something different when he wrote the story, but I look at it as a story about what happens when music evolves. It seems to get uglier and uglier and the newer preys on the old. The Preserving Machine was first published in the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction in 1953

Expendable
A man overhears to insects discussing how they are going to kill him, so he kills them first. Later, he hears birds discussing how to kill insects. Finally, he’s visited by some spiders who explain to him how evolution has worked through the ages and that man is a non-indigenous species that must be dealt with.

This story was a drab fairy tale. Its brevity left the character and the plot woefully underdeveloped. Expendable was first published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction in July 1953.

The Variable Man
In the 22nd century, Earth’s solar system is at war with a distant solar system it calls Centaur. The war has been a cold stalemate for many years as each side builds new weapons and the other side builds counter defenses. A computer calculates the odds of each attack and the odds have not been favorable for some time to launch a new attack. But a new weapon has been developed to destroy the Centaurian system in one fell swoop. It is nearly complete except for some highly delicate wiring scientists are having difficulty with. Meanwhile, a group of scientists exploring Earth’s early 20th century accidently bring back a man from 1914. His arrival introduces a variable to the war equation that can’t be calculated. The man, Cole, is a handyman who prides himself in being able to fix anything. Upon his arrival, he recognizes his danger and flees. He shows up in a small town where he fixes a child’s toy. Earth’s security forces as well as those working on the new weapon learn about his ability. Security wants to destroy him so they can again calculate odds of success. The weapons manufacturers want him because they think he can finish the delicate work. He ends up in the weapons factory and completes the weapon. When it is launched, it is a magnificent success – but not in the way its makers intended.

This novella is everything that is right about the science fiction of the 1950s! All of the elements of uncertainty that plagued man in the early days of the Cold War are there. The characters are rich and deep. There are great subplots and well developed characters here. All this makes the reader overlook the implausibility of a man of 1914 knowing how to work on 22nd century technology. The Variable Man was first published in Space Science Fiction Magazine in July 1953.

The Indefatigable Frog
Two professors on the opposite side of a debate over the theoretical applications of Zeno’s Paradox decide to put Zeno to the test by constructing an experiment and using a frog as a test subject. When one of the scientists challenges the results, his colleague decides to put him to the test by placing him in the experiment with interesting results.

This story was a real yawner. I suppose philosophy students might find it as a humorous source for debate. But as quality science fiction, I find it wanting. The characters, the plot, and the narrative were all lacking. The Indefatigable Frog was first published in Fantastic Story Magazine in July 1953

The Crystal Crypt
The last Terran ship is leaving Mars as the two planets inch toward war. Before the ship leaves, however, two Martians board the ship and interrogate each passenger about the destruction of a Martian city, confident the terrorists are aboard. The Martians’ truth detector does not detect a terrorist and the ship is allowed to leave. As they cruise toward Earth, a salesman sits with three other passengers and hear their tale of how the Martian city wasn’t destroyed, but taken captive.

The twist was easily spotted about one third of the way through the story and the action was lackluster. Not bad, but definitely not his best. The Crystal Crypt was originally published in Planet Stories, January 1954.

The Short Happy Life of the Brown Oxford
A college professor has discovered the secret to bringing inanimate material to life: irritate it! He develops a machine that does just this, but gets discouraged and gives it to a friend. The friend uses it to bring to life one of his shoes. The man’s shoe feels it need company and brings to life a female shoe. Scientists rush to the man’s house to behold the miracle of life from lifelessness.

There’s an element of tongue in cheek here, but the story wasn’t terribly interesting. I will say that Dick, much like Richard Matheson, makes every word count in telling a story and tells a lot of story with just a few words. The Short Happy Life of a Brown Oxford was first published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction in January 1954.

The Builder
A man is building a boat in his back yard. He has become obsessed with it and takes leave from work so he can work on it. His wife is angry because he’s become withdrawn and detached. His neighbors are bewildered at why he’s building this large craft in his yard – a boat so big that it won’t be able to be moved. One day, after a fight with his wife, the man starts to question himself as to why he’s doing it. Furthermore, he realizes that he’s put no sail or propulsion system in it. As he’s pondering this, it begins to rain and he realizes why he’s doing it.

This wasn’t science fiction. A short discussion of atomic war and the advancement of weapons development at the beginning of the story give it a sense of foreboding. The man is a veteran of World War II, but dislikes talking about the war. He has all of the symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder, even though it was not called that in the 1950s when Dick wrote this story. The Builder was first published in Amazing Stories, December 1953/January 1954.

Meddler
A scientist is summoned to a laboratory where he learns that a group of government agents has been making illegal forays into the future, doing illegal research. The exploration has apparently caused humans to become extinct. The scientist is ordered into the future to do research. He is attacked by giant butterflies, wielding tools and using corrosive saliva. He returns to the present to report his findings. As he’s reporting, a technician notices something attached to the ship.

This is an old formula for science fiction – even in Dick’s day. It really doesn’t add any new riff to the formula. The Meddler was first published in Future Science Fiction, October 1954.

Paycheck
An engineer awakens on a rocket bound for New York City, returning from a job for a major corporation. The job is so secret that his memory of the last two years has been erased. He comes to find out that, during that time, he signed a contract that allotted him certain trinkets in lieu of $50,000 pay. The trinkets seem worthless – a broken poker chip, a bus token, a piece of wire, etc. But those tokens were part of a scheme he hatched while working on the project and lead him to potentially great fortune.

This was a brilliant story that keeps the reader riveted! It is well paced and the main character is well developed. Paycheck contains a great deal of socio-economic commentary that is possibly more relevant today than it was 60 years ago. It has all the hallmarks of a great action movie and was made into a movie by the same name in 2003. One of Dick’s finest early stories. Paycheck was first published in the June 1953 edition of Imagine Magazine and was made into a movie in 2003.

The Great C
In a post-nuclear world, a young man is dispatched from a primitive village to locate a computer so that he can ask it three important questions. His goal: to confound the omniscient machine.

This short story contains a great deal of social commentary on the increasing role of machines and artificial intelligence decades before it really emerged. Dick was not only a great writer, he was incredibly prescient. The Great C was first published in Fantastic Stories in 1953.

Out in the Garden
A man goes to work every day and supports his family. He enjoys indoor activities. His wife enjoys sitting in her garden with her pet duck, meditating. One day, the husband’s friend comes to visit and remarks upon how, in Greek mythology, a god once snuck into a garden disguised as a duck and made love to a goddess, impregnating her. At that point, the wife announces she is pregnant. The baby boy is born and the duck is sent away. The boy grows up spending time in the garden, enjoying the same things the duck did.

This was a vanilla offering. There was no twist, nothing horrific, and no action. Out In the Garden was first published in Fantasy Fiction in 1953.

The King of the Elves
An elderly gas station owner, Stradach Jones is sitting in his remote station one evening in the town of Derryville, Colorado when he is approached by several small people who claim they are elves. They are wet, cold, and hungry and their king has been injured in a battle with trolls. When the king dies, the elves elect the man their new king and ask his help battling the trolls who live in the nearby mountains. The elves tell him they must meet under a huge tree on his neighbor’s property. The old man goes to meet them, but first stops by to visit his neighbor Phineas. When he gets there, he discovers that his neighbor that he’s known for many decades, is king of the trolls. A battle ensues and king Phineas and many trolls are killed. Stradach wants to return to his life as a gas station attendant. But after observing the run down condition of his shop and his home, he decides to move into the mountains with the elves.

There are story elements here similar to The Hobbit. An unlikely hero leading a band of fantastical creatures against their dire enemy. It’s a fun story that is well paced and has lots of action. No rationale for any of the unlikely events is provided, making this little fantasy even more fun. The King of the Elves was first published in Beyond Fantasy Fiction in September 1953.

Colony
Scientists sent to scout a remote planet find it idyllic. Everything about it is perfect for human habitation, except one of its indigenous life forms can imitate human technology – and it has a taste for human flesh. After many deaths among the scientific team, they decide that they can board the scout ship with nothing but their birthday suits. The ship arrives and the naked scientists board. . .

This story is a masterpiece and perhaps the finest in the book! Nary a wasted word and the premise is original. Add in a well concealed twist and haunting epilogue and you have the perfect story!

Prize Ship
The solar system is colonized and all nine planets inhabited along with several moons. The people of Ganymede are at war with the rest of the solar system, demanding higher payments for use of their moon’s docking stations to reach the rest of the solar system. The senate is just about to vote to surrender to Ganymede’s demands when the military captures a Ganymede ship. Four astronauts set off in the ship, hoping to learn how it works. Instead, they find themselves reliving the life of Gulliver from the famous children’s story.

This story was cute and fun. It wasn’t action packed. It had no social message. The characters were paper thin. But, it was a well told story with an interesting resolution. Prize Ship was first published in Galaxy Magazine June 1953.

Nanny
In the future, every family has a robot nanny. The robots take care of all domestic chores related to raising the children in the household. One night, a family’s nanny goes outside and confronts another larger nanny lurking the yard. They fight and the nanny comes away from the fight badly damaged by the larger, more modern nanny equipped with jaws. When the father takes it to the shop for repairs, the owner recommends the father buy a new, more modern nanny. He refuses and insists the older one be repaired. However, just a few days later, their nanny is bested in another fight. This time, he goes to the shop and buys a new nanny with all of the latest features and best defense equipment.

The multiple themes and subtexts of this short story make it interesting. There was a subtext of the “Keeping Up with the Joneses” consumer culture of the 1950s. There was a hint of the burgeoning arms race with weapons becoming obsolete as nations developed more sophisticated systems. There were hints at the notion of planned obsolescence which dominated the American automotive industry through the 1970s and seems to dominate the PC culture today. Dick squeezed a lot of subtext into a story that also had a pretty decent plot. Nanny was first published in Startling Stories in 1955.

Notes
Dick comments on several of the stories included in this volume. He expresses his eternal gratitude to the late editor of the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Anthony Boucher who published Dick’s first story and mentored him in the craft of writing.

Dick also expresses the lament of most who write science fiction or genre fiction full time. People didn’t take him seriously. Shortly after publishing a story in Planet Stories, he was at work at the record shop he managed where he had several copies of the magazine on the counter. A customer saw them and said, “Philip, you don’t read that stuff, do you?” Dick was embarrassed to say that, not only did he read it, he wrote it.

This first volume of Philip K. Dick’s short fiction introduces the themes that dominate his writing throughout his storied career. His abhorrence of war. Fear of atomic destruction. The folly of over reliance on technology. Dick is able to introduce these themes, make the reader consider his subtext, all while telling superb, plot driven fiction.

My Favorite Horror Story edited by Mike Baker and Martin H. Greenburg

My Favorite Horror Story
Edited by Mike Baker and Martin H. Greenberg

The concept of this anthology is simple. The editors asked several prominent horror and science fiction writers to submit their favorite horror stories. The sum is a collection of stories that inspired today’s best writers to write.

I enjoy short horror fiction. Stephen King, in describing the satisfaction of reading a good short story, made an apt comparison between the short story and a novel. He likened a novel to a long love affair while comparing the short story to a quick kiss from a stranger. While I’ve ever experienced the latter, I’ve got to believe the experience would be enjoyable.

Sweets to the Sweet
By Robert Bloch
Submitted by Stephen King

A nanny has quit the employ of a wealthy aristocrat because she can no longer care for the man’s daughter whom she describes as evil – so evil even her own father hates her. When the man’s brother goes to his house to see the girl and investigate, he finds the girl playing with her toys, which are really just “candy”.

Movie fans know of Bloch’s most prolific work, Psycho, a novella that Alfred Hitchcock made into one of the greatest horror movies of all time. Connoisseurs of horror fiction know Bloch as one of the masters and great contributors to contemporary genre fiction. Like most Bloch work, the prose is short and the story well paced.

The Father Thing
By Phillip K. Dick
Submitted by Ed Gorman

Aliens have eaten Charles Watsons’ father. He must flee from the awful thing that has taken its place and take revenge on its evil master.

This is the only Dick story I’ve ever read and, while I enjoyed it, I enjoyed the movie, “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” more which this story resembles closely. That novel was written by Jack Finney and they were written about the same time. Finney’s allegory about the Red Scare of the 1950s is deliberately thinly veiled. Dick’s story is not an allegory, but an attempt to convey the horror of a child. As we all know from being children, the imagined horrors of our youth are the most intense. Dick does an adequate, but not superb job in capturing that.

The Distributor
By Richard Matheson
Submitted by Ed Gorman

A new man moves into Joseph Alston’s neighborhood and promptly introduces himself to Alston as Theodore Gordon. At first, Gordon seems amicable enough. But soon, he starts to “redistribute” the belongings of his neighbors. When they complain, Gordon seizes control of the neighborhood through nefarious and prurient means.

I have a passion for Matheson’s work. I have read about half of it and am looking forward to taking more soon. He is rivaled only by Bradbury in his ability to tell great genre short stories. Matheson’s prose is a forerunner to that of writers such as Stephen King who tells great tales in a straightforward manner (usually). The Distributor is just another of Matheson’s wonderful stories. Certainly not his best, but I’ve never read or seen anything by Matheson I would call bad.

The thing about Matheson is, almost everybody is familiar with his work, but they don’t know it. He wrote 13 scripts for Rod Serling’s “Twilight Zone” including several of its most famous episodes like “Terror at 20,000 Feet”. He wrote I Am Legend that has been made into three different movies. He also is known for blending romance and fantasy in such books made into movies as Somewhere in Time and What Dreams May Come.

A Warning to the Curious
By M.R. James
Submitted by Ramsey Campbell

A young man spins a tale in an English country inn about great and powerful artifacts of a forgotten age buried in the countryside. He convinces two older gentlemen to help him unearth these artifacts. Someone lives to tell the tale. . .

This is the one story in the book I really did not enjoy. Campbell tells us he appreciates the “lightness” of James’ writing. I found it dull. I liked the story concept a great deal. The two older gentlemen remind me of members of “The Chowder Society” of Peter Straub’s Ghost Story. However, sometimes the failing of a story is in the poor telling of a good tale.

Opening the Door
By Arthur Machen
Submitted by Peter Atkins

A cynical journalist recounts his encounter with a man known as “The Canonbury Clergyman”. His interviews with the clergyman leave him with large gaps in his memory and disorients him in a way that is hard to reconcile with his journalist’s hardened sensibilities. When the clergyman vanishes, he recounts it as perhaps the only true case of a human being truly disappearing from existence.

I like the journalist character who, as a Fleet Street tabloid writer, is a bit of an anti-hero. Machen tells the tale as any journalist would – events chronologically told with insights from the author. It reads like a feature article from a newspaper. Machen was a journalist by trade, so he was in his element when he wrote it. This was my first experience with Machen and he’s an author more of whose works I hope to read.



The Colour Out of Space
By H.P. Lovecraft
Submitted by Richard Laymon

A meteor crashes into a New England farm. Soon, the family living on that farm devolve from human beings into subhuman beings. His neighbors and the local constabulary investigate to find the greatest horror man has ever known.

Lovecraft never tells a tale from the point of view of the victims of horror. Lovecraft’s narrative always comes from a third party observer. That is how Lovecraft terrifies the reader without ever quite showing the source of that terror. This story is a rare instance when the narrator is directly engaged in the action and sees the nature of the horror – a meteor whose description is of no color, yet of all colors. Stephen King retold this tale in a campy fashion for his anthology movie, “Creepshow”.

The Inner Room
By Robert Aickman
Submitted by Peter Straub

A young girl acquires a large dollhouse from a country antique store. The dollhouse is large enough that an entire room is required to accommodate it. Parts of it are strangely inaccessible, although its features can be observed through windows – except for room in the center of the house. The secrets of that room and that house will go on to dominate the girl and her brother into their adult years.

I read this story in a series of short installments and that may have made the experience less rewarding. I found the description of the house confusing and impossible to picture in my own mind. However, as the kids grow and the memories of the house instead of the house itself , come to the fore, the story really picks up and finishes nicely.

Young Goodman Brown
By Nathaniel Hawthorne
Submitted by Rick Hautula

A young man ventures into the woods on a quest to discover his own nature and test his own morals. While there, the true nature of his wife, friends, and associates is revealed in its most debased form. Brown’s own morality is tested and he is tempted with his basest desires by the devil himself.

I read this in college and enjoyed it a great deal. I did not enjoy it so much when rereading. Some stories can only by enjoyed once, I think. I’m not a fan of classical literature – preferring modern prose. However, it is impossible to not acknowledge the contributions of early writers like Hawthorne to the development of genre fiction.

The Rats in the Walls
By H.P. Lovecraft
Submitted by Michael Slade

A young man, traveling by bicycle through New England, tries to find shelter in what appears to be an empty house. But the house is not empty. It is inhabited by a absurdly weird man who has a number of guests “living” upstairs.

I’ve read almost all of Lovecraft’s fiction and this story still ranks as my favorite. The key component of Lovecraft’s fiction is dread. Seldom do we witness the horror – whether it precedes the story or is the climax. In this story, as in most others, our imagination finishes the tale for us much better than any written word. Lovecraft knew, perhaps better than any other writer, how to let the reader’s imagination finish the tale.

The Dog Park
By Dennis Etchison
Submitted by Richard Matheson

In the wealthiest of suburbs in Los Angeles, there is a dog park utilized by the rich and the famous – and their dogs. The hero of the story lost his dog in that park and isn’t quite sure why. He goes back to explore the park and meets a woman. As they talk, the woman’s dog meets its fate and the man learns the park’s secrets.

While this was an enjoyable tale, the social commentary was entirely too thinly veiled as to detract from the story. I have to believe Matheson has read better fiction than ths.

The Animal Fair
By Robert Bloch
Submitted by Joe R. Lansdale

A drifter comes across a traveling “jungle show” and is horrified with inhuman cruelty which the show’s host submits the show’s prime exhibit – a trained gorilla. After leaving the show, the drifter is hitchhiking when he is picked up by the show’s master. As they travel across the country – with the poor ape in tow – the circus master relates his own tale of inhuman cruelty done to him.

While the nature of the tale is much different than that of Psycho, the telling is the same. There’s no supernatural or fantastic element to the story. It’s just a horrific tale of the sometimes inhumane nature of man.

The Pattern
By Ramsey Campbell
Submitted by Poppy Z. Brite

A young couple – the man an artist and the woman a writer – rent a secluded cabin in the English country. Their first night there, the hear a horrific scream which could only be human. They search for its source and can find no evidence of anything amiss. When they make inquiries of the locals, they are told some secrets are better left undiscovered.

The story was decent, but what struck me was how vividly Campbell can describe a setting or scene. While good settings are an element of a story, they usually can’t carry a story. Here, Campbell’s brilliant descriptions elevate an average story to brilliant.

The Tell-Tale Heart
By Edgar Allan Poe
Submitted by Joyce Carol Oates

A young man slays a rival and conceals his body beneath the floor boards of his home. He tries to convince himself of both the infallibility of his concealment and the righteousness of his deed. When the inspectors arrive to search for the missing man, he smugly invites them in to examine his abode, quite confident they will not find the missing body. But the beating of the heart. . .if he can hear it, can the inspectors?

It is impossible to take a high school literature class and not be assigned this story. It is one of the most famous stories in history, spoofed, imitated and retold countless times. Poe’s legacy is the most enduring of any American horror writer.

An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge
By Ambrose Bierce
Submitted by Dennis Etchison

A confederate spy is about to hang for attempting to sabotage the Owl Creek Bridge. The hanging goes awry and he escapes into the river below. He eludes the Union troops pursuing him until he gets home when. . . .

I first read this story when I was in grade school and it was my first experience with a plot twist. It made an indelible impression on me. I forgot the author, but never the story, until I was in high school when it assigned in a literature class. Now, the name Ambrose Bierce, for me, will be forever linked to everything that is great in short fiction.

Bierce wrote more than one hundred short stories – mostly real life or supernatural horror from the Civil War. This particular story was adapted into a 22 minute film, without dialogue, for Rod Serling’s “Twilight Zone” with exceptional quality. It was also adapted for radio for the CBS Radio Mystery Theater in the 1970s.

The Human Chair
By Edogawa Rampo
Submitted by Harlan Ellison

A Japanese writer receives a strange letter from a furniture maker, telling her of how he designed a chair that allows him to hide inside it, undetected. He recounts how he used the chair to take up residence in an expensive hotel and make a living as a thief. Soon, his use of the chair becomes more prurient and horrifying.

This story had a delightful twist. It was originally written in Japanese and the translation is sometimes a bit stilted – lapsing into passive voice when active voice would have b been better. Nonetheless, Ellison promises a horror story to rival anything written by American or British authors and he does not disappoint.