I have wanted to read some of Philip K. Dick’s work for a long time. I am a big fan of Blade Runner, and also Total Recall and Minority Report. I’ve read about the man, and I understand Hollywood puts its own twists on things, but I wanted to read the real material.

I wanted to read Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, but We Can Remember It for You Wholesale kind of jumped out at me first and I decided to give it a whirl.

Summary
Douglas Quail lives the boring life of a clerk. He dreams about going to Mars and being a secret agent, so he visits a business called Rekal Incorporated to have false memories implanted in his mind. Things go wrong when it appears he really was a secret agent on Mars...

OVERALL: 2.8 out of 5
It’s almost impossible for me to keep my ideas about the movie out of my thoughts about the story; I think it changed my perspective while reading it as well too, and the story may have been harder to understand without that background.
The story is clever though. I feel like I should have seen the ending coming, and all of it wraps up really well at the end. The second half of the story is nothing like the second half of the movie.
It’s easy to see Dick’s appeal. The world he paints, which is rather sparse due to his rough writing style, is still filled with clues about his thoughts of the future. Pretty female receptionists are naked from the waist up, but paint their breasts in vivid colors. Taxis are driven by robots that can’t distinguish the gender of their fares. Memories are routinely wiped out and replaced; it’s an interesting world, and no wonder Hollywood loves adapting his stuff.


RATINGS BY CATEGORY:
Characters: 2 out of 5
The characters don’t get a lot of attention, and yet they’re still there. Mister McClane is overweight and frequently nervous; he doesn’t seem like a very good salesman. Doug Quail is boring, which fits. They aren’t that interesting really; it’s the story that keeps things going.

Pace: 4 out of 5
Dick’s writing seems almost frantic. He moves so quickly, he disregards other elements of the story that might be interesting. The copy I read felt like a rough draft, but moved fast.

Story: 4 out of 5
This story is really interesting, even by today’s standards. It is about the human mind and our perceptions of reality, and it is really nothing like the movie. There is a twist ending that I probably should have anticipated, but I thought was pretty clever.

Dialogue: 2 out of 5
The characters speak in a mix of proper sentences and shorter abbreviations. I don’t think anyone talks like this, including the people of the future. It serves its purpose, although the characters did seem to talk at each other occasionally, instead of to each other.

Style/Technical: 2 out of 5
This story feels like a rough draft, but it works. I don’t think most modern editors would accept this without some polishing. However, the viewpoint perspective is always clear, and I was able to follow the story without problems.
I might have had more problems if I wasn’t familiar with the basic plot from the movie though.