Science Fiction Books > R Science Fiction Books > Philip K. Dick

Advantages: Utterly readable and compelling
Disadvantages: You probably need to be interested in the author to enjoy it

This is a minority view, but in my opinion the posthumously published "Radio Free Albemuth" is Dick's best book. Although a first draft of the novel that eventually became "VALIS", this original version is very different, and to my mind preferable as it tells a more coherent story. The narrator is an sf writer called Philip K Dick. In the early seventies Dick underwent some experiences which he interpreted as religious. He became convinced he was ...
...out which God or why. "Radio Free Albemuth" was his first attempt to address these issues in a science fiction framework. He splits himself into two characters, Dick the writer and his friend Nicholas Brady, and pits them against the forces of darkness as personified by President Ferris F Freemont - a fictional version of Nixon. "Radio Free Albemuth" is literally insane, a paranoid book inspired by Dick's own delusions. Yet it remains as compelling ... Read review

Advantages: Great Read.
Disadvantages: None.

The Foreigners. Author - James Lovegrove. Introduction: ********* And suddenly they where everywhere. In the parks, in the buildings and walking the streets as though they had always been there. The Foreigners where seven foot tall and wore golden masks atop their robed bobies. They brought with ther 'Crystech', a power source and unbreakable building material. But more importantly with their arrival came peace to mankind. Some thought it ...
...not alone in the universe, some thought the foriegners may be exuding pheromones. What ever the reason none thought about it too hard or too closely lest the bubble be burst and mankind fall backwards to what it had been. The world is still deceiv'd with ornament. Bassanio, The Merchant of Venice. Synopsis: ******* Captain Jack Parry of the Foreign Policy Police of New Venice has a tricky investigation to conduct. One of 'The Foreigners' has ... Read review

Advantages: Imaginative, Free
Disadvantages: Read the book on computer

...Scalzi's sci-fi trilogy begins with Old Man's War (followed by The Ghost Brigades and The Last Colony); the story is told in first-person narrative by a retired ad writer named John Perry. As the title suggests, Perry joins the military when he is seventy five years old, and is given a brand new enhanced body via mind transfer (kind of like the Hulk - green and bigger) The story then go through the basic training and eventual deployment against ...
...got the book from Tor.com books freebie giveaway, checkout their site for some interesting titles. They got the books in pdf , html and mobi format. Plus as an added bonus, John Scalzi has also written a short story set in the world of Old Man's War on the website. ... Read review

Advantages: Great powerful story
Disadvantages: Shows its age a bit

...i when I was 9 the spent another 20 years trying to find another copy of the copy. So many people telling me it didn't exist I actually thought I'd imagined reading it. A the reader you follow the life of William Mandela from becoming a Private at the start of an interstellar and interspecies war right through to its conclusion several hundred years later. Mandela is a pacifist who feels out of place in this war. When travelling to various battles ...
...longer able to relate to the time he is living in due to the relative time dilation caused by almost fast as light space travel. Its great to follow him as he rises through the ranks, hearing his inner thoughts about his colleagues & superiors and his life in the miltary. The author Joe Haldeman served in the Vietnam War and is a very pleasant author who actually answer his own email & is very open to readers contacting him as I discovered when ... Read review

Advantages: remarkably prescient, masterfully told
Disadvantages: none

...Astounding Science Fiction, that the City stories by Clifford Simak were initially found. Printed as stand alones in a series during the 1940's, it was not until 1952 that they were gathered up and published as a novel. Quite often, this meant the writer had reworked his original shorts into a single flowing narrative with a worthy but somehow lesser result. With the exception of some added commentary, this is not the case with this often overlooked ...
...were all tales told around a campfire. Now, while this may seem an odd premise for a sci fi novel, when you come to understand that man has disappeared from this world, and the tales are told by sentient dogs and robots, it begins to make a bit more sense. It even becomes more startlingly likely, as one reads on, as it begins to look prescient as the best sci fi always does. How so? Well, it might have been 1940 something, but Simak foresaw the ... Read review