I'm reading Philip K Dick's Ubik. Unlike my beloved I completely missed that the characters are all wearing incredibly stupid clothes (described in detail the first time each character appears and then never mentioned again).
#philipKDick
“Displaced Person” – review by Dave Brzeski
Review by Dave Brzeski. I want to add that I first read this book almost 30 years ago, and it has stuck with me all this time. It’s a very good — but mostly forgotten — book with Lovecraftian themes.
Thanks for the review, Dave!
ALSO: I have just learned that Displaced Person was published in the USA under the title Misplaced Persons. If you can’t find a copy through the links below, or it’s too expensive, try this link: Misplaced Persons. For now at least, that link leads to cheaper copies of this novel. — MD
DISPLACED PERSON, by Lee Harding, 1979
I knew of Australian author Lee Harding, but I can’t say for sure that I’ve ever read any of his work before. I picked this one up on the recommendation of Mike Davis, who felt it had something of a Lovecraftian feel about it.
Click the image to buy DISPLACED PERSONGraeme Drury is a 17 year old youth, who gradually finds he is being ignored, simply not noticed by those around him. His situation worsens as the world around him gradually loses colour and definition. Finally he finds himself in a grey limbo where he can no longer even make physical contact with people, or objects.
Yes, it is Lovecraftian in a sort of Philip K. Dickian manner. Actually, it reminded me more of the work of Richard Matheson. I saw parallels with ‘The Incredible Shrinking Man’ in the struggles of the protagonist to survive in an increasingly alien environment. Not forgetting ‘I, Vampire’, another classic Matheson novel, dealing with a man alone in an hostile world and the horror of finding a companion, only to lose him again as the story progresses.
Graeme Drury is an amazingly intelligent and analytical young man, who finds himself examining the place of himself and, indeed the role of the entire human race in the vast unknowable universe. Are they no more than lab rats in some cosmic experiment? Why and how has he come to be where he is, and what is the mysterious intangible creeping darkness which he gradually becomes aware of? What happened to his found and lost again companions? Will he see them again, when the darkness inevitably takes him?
It’s a short book, a novella really at just 138 pages, but it’s as long as it needs to be. I consider it a good thing that it was published before the word processor heralded the reign of the over-padded, two-inch thick, doorstop novels we commonly see today.
If you’re the sort of Lovecraftian who insists on ancient tentacled gods, weird cults and forbidden tomes, then this may not be for you. If, however, your idea of Lovecraftian is along the lines of man being an insignificant speck in a cosmos ruled by unimaginable forces, totally indifferent to our petty concerns, then this certainly does fit the bill.
I also think it would make for a pretty good two, or three part TV miniseries if handled correctly.
Buy Displaced Person at Amazon.
#books #cthulhu #horror #lovecraft #philipKDick #reading #scienceFiction
𝟯 𝗪𝗼𝗿𝗱 𝗥𝗲𝘃𝗶𝗲𝘄: “𝗦𝗲𝗰𝗼𝗻𝗱 𝗩𝗮𝗿𝗶𝗲𝘁𝘆” 𝗯𝘆 𝗣𝗵𝗶𝗹𝗶𝗽 𝗞. 𝗗𝗶𝗰𝗸 -
Early post-apocalypse pulp by Dick still offers some pioneering warnings about machine learning and the human civilization's capacity for self-cannibalism.
#bookreviews #literature #books #bookworm #book #read #readreadread #3words #pkdick #philipkdick #sf #scifi #sciencefiction #secondvariety #robots #apocalypse #earlysf
I haven't posted about Paul Verhoeven, or his his directorial trademark of over the top graphic violence punctuated with a liberal use of squibs in a while. So...
Pick your favourite Paul Verhoeven film:
#Movies #Film #Cinema #RoboCop #StarshipTroopers #TotalRecall #PaulVerhoeven #RobertAHeinlein #PhilipKDick #PeterWeller #RonnyCox #MichaelIronside #Schwarzenegger #CasperVanDien #DinaMeyer #Squibs
Finished watching #ElectricDreams, a 10 part #TV anthology based on #PhilipKDick #scifi short stories.
I binged it in 2018 & was disappointed it wasn't more street #cyberpunk
Watching without expectations now, it made more sense, was engaging & moving and is very prescient given the current desperation disposition of our geopolitical world & it's tendency towards inequality, desperation, over-surveillance & violent authoritarianism.
Finished watching #ElectricDreams, a 10 part #TV anthology based on #PhilipKDick #scifi short stories.
I binged it in 2018 & was disappointed it wasn't more street #cyberpunk
Watching without expectations now, it made more sense, was engaging & moving and is very prescient given the current desperation disposition of our geopolitical world & it's tendency towards inequality, desperation, over-surveillance & violent authoritarianism.
It's a war not too far in the future, and it hasn't happened yet—only it WILL happen. It's "Breakfast at Twilight" by Philip K. Dick, from the July 1954 issue of Amazing Stories!
https://sffremembrance.com/2025/06/03/short-story-review-breakfast-at-twilight-by-philip-k-dick/
#review #sciencefiction #philipkdick
There's a coin flip simulator because the real world is no longer needed:
Higher than the Shoulders of Giants; Or, a Scientist’s History of Drugs
April 19, 2021
slimemoldtimemold
#drugs #economics #history #madscience
#genius
#sciencefiction #FrankHerbert #carlsagan #philipkdick and others
Current News from the United States of America:
#PresidentTrump spreads a post claiming #PresidentBiden had been executed and replaced by a robotic clone. 🥴
😒
11 injured in shooting at house party in #NorthCarolina
People set on fire in #BoulderColarado
** #InternationalTourism to #America is down, #AmericanNewsMedia offer various reasons, but hope that things will pick up as Summer approaches. :bl46:
Bye Bye American Pie
@sir_toootenstein @normis @stux
If nothing is real, then anything can be believed. If you don't have an Uncle Fred, you can create one using AI and try to convince him about "fake reality". We now live in a #Kafkaocean #Dadaist Age, and #RodSerling and #PhilipKDick were prophets. :skp904:
On this day in 1990, Paul Verhoeven’s *Total Recall* hit U.S. theaters, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. In contrast, Bluestem Prairie faces a $2.5 million deficit due to funding cuts, while Blue Virginia debates Trump’s tariff proposals and Medicaid changes. Meanwhile, researchers dive into dinosaur cancer treatments. For more insights, check out the Round Up by driftglass on the Professional Left Podcast.
#TotalRecall, #PaulVerhoeven, #PhilipKDick, #BluestemPrairie, #MedicaidCuts, #DinosaurResearch, #CancerTreatment, #PoliticalNews https://crooksandliars.com/2025/05/mike-s-blog-round-12
I read a book and wrote a few words about it.
#Reader #ReadingCommunity #ReaderSky
#SciFi #BookReview #BookSky
#PhilipKDick #Ubik
#WhoNeedsABlog
https://cjpayling.wordpress.com/2025/05/30/who-needs-a-blog-with-book-reviews-ubik/
Ken stirred and murmured, "Could you be induced to crawl across the street? There's that corpse there and it might have cigarettes on it."
#PhilipKDick Awww yeah.
@oldredsubby.bsky.social
AI Code Hallucinations Increase the Risk of ‘Package Confusion’ Attacks - This could a line from a #PhilipKDick novel. 😂
This song is super underrated imo. Reminds me of #PhilipKDick #veto
I also like the way Veto uses, what I assume is a theremin in the song.
When reading a novel, you concentrate on the story; the more successful authors becoming increasingly unobtrusive as you read on.
For me, an exception to this is #philipkdick - I constantly try to imagine what Phil REALLY thought, what he felt, what was going on, as I read through.
“Somehow the loss of his precious #Bartok collection drove him into more of frenzy than anything else so far.” - #PhilipKDick, Eye in the Sky.
I’m (re)-reading Eye in the Sky, by #PhilipKDick.
RE: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:5zca2ola2zxpkw37w4f3wxtu/post/3lot37izhes2p
Science Fiction and Other Suspect Ruminationssciencefictionruminations.com@sciencefictionruminations.com
2025-05-10Recent Science Fiction Purchases No. CCCXLIII (Philip K. Dick, Roger Zelazny, Chuck Rothman, Philip José Farmer, and an anthology on Future Love)
Which books/covers/authors intrigue you? Which have you read? Disliked? Enjoyed?
1. Deus Irae, Philip K. Dick and Roger Zelazny (1976)
- Richard Corben’s cover for the 1980 edition
From the back cover: “One their own, they have written landmarks works that have added whole new dimensions of wonder to the field of science fiction. Now, in Deus Irae, they have created what ALA Booklist calls “the most successful collaboration in years!”–set in in bizarre world where you will encounter…
A bunch of backwoods farmers who happen to be lizards…
A tribe of foul-mouthed giant bugs who worship a dead VW sedan…
An automated factory that can’t decide whether to serve its customers–or kill them.
Across this nightmare landscape–pursued by an avenging angel on a bicycle–one man makes a painful pilgrimage in search of the one who changed the world so drastically–the legendary, by very, God of Wrath…”
Initial Thoughts: I’ve heard that this co-written book by Dick and Zelazny is far from their respective best. I’m still curious!
2. Staroamer’s Fate, Chuck Rothman (1986)
- Enric’s cover for the 1st edition
From the back cover: “QUARNIAN DOW. Space salvager, planet tamer, dreamstone thief, revolutionary–Quarnian was a woman with a destiny, a gold star syron gifted with the ability to “know” the future and to see into the hearts and minds of others. But the very talent that let her bend others to her will was the curse that made her a lone adventurer, called by some inner voice to world after world, challenge after challenge.
Now the destiny was again calling Quarnian… this time to a rendezvous with a long-lost legend–and a journey of discovery that could change the fate of all who roamed the skies…”
Initial Thoughts: I acquired this one as it contains a generation ship. I am an aficionado of the generation ship. Here’s a list I’ve compiled on the topic with links to those I’ve reviewed. I assume the novel will be poor despite the theme.
3. Flesh, Philip José Farmer (1960)
- Ellen Raskin’s cover for the 1969 edition
From the back cover: “HE WAS THE SUNHERO. STUD-GOD TO A MILLION ADORING FEMALES.
After 800 years of exploring the stars Space Commander Stagg had expected a hero’s welcome–but this was awesome. First, they grafted real antlers on his head. Then they invested him with the pure sex power of 50 bulls and turned him loose on a screaming frenzy of fire-up virgins. Now he was on an ecstatic public fertility tour that took in every available female–and could soon take his life…”
Initial Thoughts: In January, I acquired the 1st edition of Farmer’s Flesh. He revised the novel for all the post-1968 printings. If rewrites occur within my date ranges, I’m always interested in the nature of revision especially as the early 1960s vs. late 1960s were radically different in the allowed content. Perhaps the revisions reflect this. We shall see!
4. Future Love: A Science Fiction Triad, ed. Roger Elwood (1977)
- Don Carroll’s cover for the 1st edition
Contents: Anne McCaffrey’s “The Greatest Love” (1977), Joan Hunter Holly’s “Psi Clone” (1977), and Jeffrey A. Carver’s “Love Rogo” (1977).
From the back cover: “Anne McCaffrey, who is probably well known to most readers of this book, examines in her story a mother love that goes beyond the physical, in a new and different sense of that phrase; a sense, in fact, not possible until present-day medical technology gave us the means of realizing it. That particular gift of Anne McCaffrey is that she can infuse such an intense human light and warmth into a hitherto-unknown, laboratory-cold subject that it takes on the familiar, common quality of everyday readerly lives.
Joan Holly, who has also been writing SF successfully for years, deals with a different kind of parent-child pattern. Again there is a love situation emerging out of a relationship which would have been impossible before present-day science gave it to us as something that could happen. But here again, through Joan Holly’s creativity, we have an intense, swift-running story, like a landslide channeled between canyon walls so deep they almost shut out the light.
Jeffrey Carver goes one step beyond the interaction of ordinary human love. He plunges the reader into a small whirlpool of individual lives, carried along with the rushing current of power, plunging ever more swiftly toward the bring of a waterfall. Here, the love is not between human and human, but between human and something else–a love that in the end betrays.”
Initial Thoughts: I have not read any work by Holly or Carver. As for McCaffrey, she was an adored author of my childhood—I read and reread and reread her Pern novels (and the endless prequels and side-series and volumes written with her son). I suspect she’s an author that would lose a bit of the luster if I returned to my nostalgic favorites.
For book reviews consult the INDEX
For cover art posts consult the INDEX
For TV and film reviews consult the INDEX
#1960s #1970s #AnneMcCaffrey #avantGarde #ChuckRothman #JeffreyACarver #paperbacks #PhilipJoséFarmer #philipKDick #RogerElwood #RogerZelazny #sciFi #scienceFiction #spaceships
Client Info
Server: https://mastodon.social
Version: 2025.04
Repository: https://github.com/cyevgeniy/lmst