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13 Short Stories by Philip K. Dick
Second Variety
The Variable Man
Beyond Lies The Wub
The Eyes Have It
Mr Spaceship
Beyond The Door
The Skull
The Defenders
The Crystal Crypt
The Gun
Tony And The Beetles
Piper in the Woods
The Hanging Stranger
Philip K. Dick was an American science-fiction novelist, short-story writer and essayist. His first short story, “Beyond Lies the Wub,” was published shortly after his high school graduation. Some of his most famous short stories were adapted for film, including “The Minority Report,” “Paycheck,” “Second Variety” (adapted into the film Screamers) and “We Can Remember It For You Wholesale” (adapted into the film Total Recall).
The Variable Man
Beyond Lies The Wub
The Eyes Have It
Mr Spaceship
Beyond The Door
The Skull
The Defenders
The Crystal Crypt
The Gun
Tony And The Beetles
Piper in the Woods
The Hanging Stranger
Philip K. Dick was an American science-fiction novelist, short-story writer and essayist. His first short story, “Beyond Lies the Wub,” was published shortly after his high school graduation. Some of his most famous short stories were adapted for film, including “The Minority Report,” “Paycheck,” “Second Variety” (adapted into the film Screamers) and “We Can Remember It For You Wholesale” (adapted into the film Total Recall).
616 pages, Kindle Edition
First published March 13, 2014
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104 people want to read
About the author
Philip K. Dick
2,016 books22.6k followersPhilip Kindred Dick was a prolific American science fiction author whose work has had a lasting impact on literature, cinema, and popular culture. Known for his imaginative narratives and profound philosophical themes, Dick explored the nature of reality, the boundaries of human identity, and the impact of technology and authoritarianism on society. His stories often blurred the line between the real and the artificial, challenging readers to question their perceptions and beliefs.
Raised in California, Dick began writing professionally in the early 1950s, publishing short stories in various science fiction magazines. He quickly developed a distinctive voice within the genre, marked by a fusion of science fiction concepts with deep existential and psychological inquiry. Over his career, he authored 44 novels and more than 100 short stories, many of which have become classics in the field.
Recurring themes in Dick's work include alternate realities, simulations, corporate and government control, mental illness, and the nature of consciousness. His protagonists are frequently everyday individuals—often paranoid, uncertain, or troubled—caught in surreal and often dangerous circumstances that force them to question their environment and themselves. Works such as Ubik, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, and A Scanner Darkly reflect his fascination with perception and altered states of consciousness, often drawing from his own experiences with mental health struggles and drug use.
One of Dick’s most influential novels is Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, which served as the basis for Ridley Scott’s iconic film Blade Runner. The novel deals with the distinction between humans and artificial beings and asks profound questions about empathy, identity, and what it means to be alive. Other adaptations of his work include Total Recall, Minority Report, A Scanner Darkly, and The Man in the High Castle, each reflecting key elements of his storytelling—uncertain realities, oppressive systems, and the search for truth. These adaptations have introduced his complex ideas to audiences well beyond the traditional readership of science fiction.
In the 1970s, Dick underwent a series of visionary and mystical experiences that had a significant influence on his later writings. He described receiving profound knowledge from an external, possibly divine, source and documented these events extensively in what became known as The Exegesis, a massive and often fragmented journal. These experiences inspired his later novels, most notably the VALIS trilogy, which mixes autobiography, theology, and metaphysics in a narrative that defies conventional structure and genre boundaries.
Throughout his life, Dick faced financial instability, health issues, and periods of personal turmoil, yet he remained a dedicated and relentless writer. Despite limited commercial success during his lifetime, his reputation grew steadily, and he came to be regarded as one of the most original voices in speculative fiction. His work has been celebrated for its ability to fuse philosophical depth with gripping storytelling and has influenced not only science fiction writers but also philosophers, filmmakers, and futurists.
Dick’s legacy continues to thrive in both literary and cinematic spheres. The themes he explored remain urgently relevant in the modern world, particularly as technology increasingly intersects with human identity and governance. The Philip K. Dick Award, named in his honor, is presented annually to distinguished works of science fiction published in paperback original form in the United States. His writings have also inspired television series, academic studies, and countless homages across media.
Through his vivid imagination and unflinching inquiry into the nature of existence, Philip K. Dick redefined what science fiction could achieve. His work continues to challenge and inspire, offering timeless insights into the human condition a
Raised in California, Dick began writing professionally in the early 1950s, publishing short stories in various science fiction magazines. He quickly developed a distinctive voice within the genre, marked by a fusion of science fiction concepts with deep existential and psychological inquiry. Over his career, he authored 44 novels and more than 100 short stories, many of which have become classics in the field.
Recurring themes in Dick's work include alternate realities, simulations, corporate and government control, mental illness, and the nature of consciousness. His protagonists are frequently everyday individuals—often paranoid, uncertain, or troubled—caught in surreal and often dangerous circumstances that force them to question their environment and themselves. Works such as Ubik, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, and A Scanner Darkly reflect his fascination with perception and altered states of consciousness, often drawing from his own experiences with mental health struggles and drug use.
One of Dick’s most influential novels is Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, which served as the basis for Ridley Scott’s iconic film Blade Runner. The novel deals with the distinction between humans and artificial beings and asks profound questions about empathy, identity, and what it means to be alive. Other adaptations of his work include Total Recall, Minority Report, A Scanner Darkly, and The Man in the High Castle, each reflecting key elements of his storytelling—uncertain realities, oppressive systems, and the search for truth. These adaptations have introduced his complex ideas to audiences well beyond the traditional readership of science fiction.
In the 1970s, Dick underwent a series of visionary and mystical experiences that had a significant influence on his later writings. He described receiving profound knowledge from an external, possibly divine, source and documented these events extensively in what became known as The Exegesis, a massive and often fragmented journal. These experiences inspired his later novels, most notably the VALIS trilogy, which mixes autobiography, theology, and metaphysics in a narrative that defies conventional structure and genre boundaries.
Throughout his life, Dick faced financial instability, health issues, and periods of personal turmoil, yet he remained a dedicated and relentless writer. Despite limited commercial success during his lifetime, his reputation grew steadily, and he came to be regarded as one of the most original voices in speculative fiction. His work has been celebrated for its ability to fuse philosophical depth with gripping storytelling and has influenced not only science fiction writers but also philosophers, filmmakers, and futurists.
Dick’s legacy continues to thrive in both literary and cinematic spheres. The themes he explored remain urgently relevant in the modern world, particularly as technology increasingly intersects with human identity and governance. The Philip K. Dick Award, named in his honor, is presented annually to distinguished works of science fiction published in paperback original form in the United States. His writings have also inspired television series, academic studies, and countless homages across media.
Through his vivid imagination and unflinching inquiry into the nature of existence, Philip K. Dick redefined what science fiction could achieve. His work continues to challenge and inspire, offering timeless insights into the human condition a
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
April 11, 2023
Dick's influence in modern SciFi and even some architectural designs should be celebrated more
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September 5, 2017I think these are early stories, so I can only surmise that this is before Dick really learnt how to write. All the usual paranoiac themes are there, but there is just no flourish or narrative drive to these - they could have been written by a high school kid. I was just getting depressed reading these so I've put it aside :(
September 29, 2020
One of my rare forays into science fiction. It still isn't my favorite genre, but it's nice from time to time.
These stories sound very cold-war-ish, which I guess they are, and after a while they all have similarities, so I can guess what the twist is, or how it will end.
Once again, Goodreads does not give me enough space for all my private notes, so I will have to store them here in the public notes section. Along those lines, everything that follows below CONTAINS SPOILERS:
SPOILERS BELOW:
1: Beyond lies the Wub. There is a fat pig-like creature that is sold by "natives" to people on a spaceship. They want to kill the creature and eat it, but the creature speaks. It asks not to be killed (but doesn't beg or anything). The captain decides to shoot it anyway. He is the only one to then eat it, and after a while it turns out the creature is speaking through him, and just transferred body. The author missed an opportunity not calling this "Therein lies the wub", imho.
2: The gun: Some astronauts come upon a country devastated by nuclear fission. But they are shot at by a gun. They land for repairs. The planet sounds like earth to me. Anyway, turns out the gun was operating automatically, so they disarmed it, planning to return with a team to retrieve all the objects. As they leave more robots are fixing the gun.
3. The Skull: A man is sent back in time to kill a man who will end all war. Turns out the man he's supposed to kill is himself.
4. The Defenders: Everyone's living underground due to nuclear holocaust. Robots on the surface fight their war for them. Turns out the robots were lying and it isn't radioactive anymore, but they weren't told bc the robots were trying to end war. Cheesy ending where they meet some Russians and somehow communicate and get along.
5. The eyes have it: Amusing criticism of turns of phrase, and possibly bad editing (which would be ironic, given the not-so-good editing of this book)
6. Hanging Stranger: A man sees a body hanging from a lamppost in town. But everyone besides the main protagonist seems so nonchalant about it. Turns out it was bait so the aliens could find out who they weren't able to turn.
7. Mr. Spaceship: In the interplanetary war, they decide to control a spaceship using a brain. They find an old professor, who accepts, with some tweaks. Anyway, he's taken control of the spaceship, and gets two of his pupils (male and female) to repopulate a new planet with a brand new (very inbred) human race.
8. Piper in the woods: People start turning into plants (or being convinced they are plants), including the man sent to the woods to figure out what was going on.
9: Second Variety: This was probably my favorite thus far. There are robots created to destroy humans (heat-seeking). Turns out the robots have been building other robots, which look just like humans. An American gets taken in by Russians in their bunker. One of them kills the other, thinking he's a robot. But he's not. Turns out the russian shooter was a robot. The American tells the remaining russian girl how to get to the base (he is injured) on the moon. He discovers she was a robot too. He smiles thinking how this new race of beings already started finding ways to destroy each other, like humans did.
10: Tony and the beetles: A human kid, living on a beetle planet, plays with beetle friends. Humans must be colonists, because when the war turns in the beetles' favor, they start treating the boy badly. I noticed they called the humans "white grubs", "because of their softness, their whiteness". So, I guess only white people colonized the planet.
11: The Variable man: This was the longest story, and possibly my favorite. A man from 1913 is brought to the future by mistake. altering the probabilities of successfully annihilating some other planet (but no one knows why). Regardless, a bad politician plans to kill him, while the engineer wants to hire him. He is able to and the man fixes their space rocket that can travel faster than the speed of light, so they don't need to annihilate the other planet anymore (they can travel to other dimensions or something now). The bad politician is arrested.
12: Beyond the door: An odd story. A man buys a cuckoo clock for his wife. she loves it and speaks to it, but she's having an affair with another man and gets caught. She gets kicked out. The man decides to smash the cuckoo clock, but it apparently pecks at him and makes him fall and die.
13: The Crystal Crypt: 3 terrans find a way to miniaturize a Martian city and fit it in a globe, escaping on the last ship to earth. They tell their story to a man, who turns out to be martian and stops them. Once again, Martians see humans as pale, so I guess only white humans are on Mars or something.
These stories sound very cold-war-ish, which I guess they are, and after a while they all have similarities, so I can guess what the twist is, or how it will end.
Once again, Goodreads does not give me enough space for all my private notes, so I will have to store them here in the public notes section. Along those lines, everything that follows below CONTAINS SPOILERS:
SPOILERS BELOW:
1: Beyond lies the Wub. There is a fat pig-like creature that is sold by "natives" to people on a spaceship. They want to kill the creature and eat it, but the creature speaks. It asks not to be killed (but doesn't beg or anything). The captain decides to shoot it anyway. He is the only one to then eat it, and after a while it turns out the creature is speaking through him, and just transferred body. The author missed an opportunity not calling this "Therein lies the wub", imho.
2: The gun: Some astronauts come upon a country devastated by nuclear fission. But they are shot at by a gun. They land for repairs. The planet sounds like earth to me. Anyway, turns out the gun was operating automatically, so they disarmed it, planning to return with a team to retrieve all the objects. As they leave more robots are fixing the gun.
3. The Skull: A man is sent back in time to kill a man who will end all war. Turns out the man he's supposed to kill is himself.
4. The Defenders: Everyone's living underground due to nuclear holocaust. Robots on the surface fight their war for them. Turns out the robots were lying and it isn't radioactive anymore, but they weren't told bc the robots were trying to end war. Cheesy ending where they meet some Russians and somehow communicate and get along.
5. The eyes have it: Amusing criticism of turns of phrase, and possibly bad editing (which would be ironic, given the not-so-good editing of this book)
6. Hanging Stranger: A man sees a body hanging from a lamppost in town. But everyone besides the main protagonist seems so nonchalant about it. Turns out it was bait so the aliens could find out who they weren't able to turn.
7. Mr. Spaceship: In the interplanetary war, they decide to control a spaceship using a brain. They find an old professor, who accepts, with some tweaks. Anyway, he's taken control of the spaceship, and gets two of his pupils (male and female) to repopulate a new planet with a brand new (very inbred) human race.
8. Piper in the woods: People start turning into plants (or being convinced they are plants), including the man sent to the woods to figure out what was going on.
9: Second Variety: This was probably my favorite thus far. There are robots created to destroy humans (heat-seeking). Turns out the robots have been building other robots, which look just like humans. An American gets taken in by Russians in their bunker. One of them kills the other, thinking he's a robot. But he's not. Turns out the russian shooter was a robot. The American tells the remaining russian girl how to get to the base (he is injured) on the moon. He discovers she was a robot too. He smiles thinking how this new race of beings already started finding ways to destroy each other, like humans did.
10: Tony and the beetles: A human kid, living on a beetle planet, plays with beetle friends. Humans must be colonists, because when the war turns in the beetles' favor, they start treating the boy badly. I noticed they called the humans "white grubs", "because of their softness, their whiteness". So, I guess only white people colonized the planet.
11: The Variable man: This was the longest story, and possibly my favorite. A man from 1913 is brought to the future by mistake. altering the probabilities of successfully annihilating some other planet (but no one knows why). Regardless, a bad politician plans to kill him, while the engineer wants to hire him. He is able to and the man fixes their space rocket that can travel faster than the speed of light, so they don't need to annihilate the other planet anymore (they can travel to other dimensions or something now). The bad politician is arrested.
12: Beyond the door: An odd story. A man buys a cuckoo clock for his wife. she loves it and speaks to it, but she's having an affair with another man and gets caught. She gets kicked out. The man decides to smash the cuckoo clock, but it apparently pecks at him and makes him fall and die.
13: The Crystal Crypt: 3 terrans find a way to miniaturize a Martian city and fit it in a globe, escaping on the last ship to earth. They tell their story to a man, who turns out to be martian and stops them. Once again, Martians see humans as pale, so I guess only white humans are on Mars or something.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 18, 2019
It is PKD, what more needs be said!?
September 16, 2021
This one definitely got better towards the end, especially the last few stories.
April 22, 2015
Interesting to read Dick's earlier (and public-domain) work, before he became too misogynistic and the paranoid tone of his novels took over his life. Some pretty middle-of-the-road science fiction, typical of the time period. The sense of humor is these stories is much more playful than in later works (which became by turns sardonic and bitter). Some entertaining stories, and a couple that are dated but show something about the zeitgeist of their era.
July 11, 2016
Dick at his best as usual...,
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews