Galactic Pot-Healer in Philip K Dick

Jan 26, 2011 Mad Dog rated it it was ok

This is a PKD book that I think is only for big PKD fans (like me). It is probably my 'least fave' book of PKDs. It is a very 'sci-fi-y' book with weird creatures, a dystopia, and takes place largely on another planet. I would categorize this book as 'sci-fi' and theological fiction. For vastly better theological fiction, I would recommend VALIS by PKD. VALIS combines both personal and theological elements very well (and is at least partially autobiographical fiction from PKD). You could really This is a PKD book that I think is only for big PKD fans (like me). It is probably my 'least fave' book of PKDs. It is a very 'sci-fi-y' book with weird creatures, a dystopia, and takes place largely on another planet. I would categorize this book as 'sci-fi' and theological fiction. For vastly better theological fiction, I would recommend VALIS by PKD. VALIS combines both personal and theological elements very well (and is at least partially autobiographical fiction from PKD). You could really 'feel' VALIS.

My biggest stumbling block with this book is the lack of real dilemma in the book. The dilemma presented at the beginning of the book was interesting (a man(our protagonist) stuck in a rut faces the prospect of doing something meaningful in his life). But the larger premise(gathering people together on a planet to help a 'supreme being' raise up a castle from the sea) lacks any dilemma that I could find. There were two main reasons that I didn't see much dilemma: it was never clear to me how the people were really any help to the 'supreme being' AND I never really understood the significance of raising up the castle. There is a climactic battle between the 'supreme being' and his evil counterpart. But the battle is a wrestling match under the sea and is only vaguely presented to the reader. There is a lot of 'theological discussion' that I recognized as 'gnostic', but I didn't really follow. It might have helped my enjoyment (and discernment of the dilemmas) if I had read Kant and other referenced 'theologically based' literature. I don't see how anyone could enjoy this book w/o knowledge of this 'reference material'.

There is a lot of humor in this book, but much of it escaped me. There were some very casual notes (from a 'supreme being' to our protagonist) that could be funny (i.e. what kind of 'supreme being' writes short casual notes), but for some reason I remained largely unmoved by them.

... Bigger spoilers follow ...

The ending is fairly abrupt and emphasized (IMO) the meaninglessness of life and experience. There is some 'existential humor' in the abrupt ending, but it seemed to make the whole book act as a 'humorous farce'. Or perhaps PKD was just ready to end the book.
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Sep 23, 2025 Michael rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: science-fiction, humour, dystopia

This is one of PKD's more surreal novels, one of his later ones leading towards the VALIS books, so the plot is minimal and ideas and archetypes are prominent.

The story begins in a future pseudo-socialist dystopia: Joe leads a pointless, unfulfilling life, filling his time with vacuous games played remotely with people he's never met. In an episode of mental crisis, Joe is saved from the secret police by a mysterious alien entity, the god-like Glimmung, and escapes to Plowman's Planet to assist ...more

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Feb 24, 2021 David Agranoff rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: dark-humor, robots-androids, bizarro, political-science-fiction, monsters, old-school-sci-fi, surreal-sci-fi, super-funny, sci-fi-monster, philip-k-dick

Recording a Dickheads podcast episode soon on this book so stay tuned.

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Aug 31, 2017 Byron 'Giggsy' Paul rated it really liked it

Shelves: dystopia, phildickian, singularity

typical good mid-level PKD book. Weird. What is/isn't reality. A mindfuck with some similarities to Ubik. Another recurring ceramic pot appearance.

Here something deep:

Dick’s fascination with ceramic pots echoes our archaeological dependence on these kinds of objects to establish a kind of authentic reality in our work. Endless catalogues, exempla, and typologies structure so much archaeological knowledge as they form a bridge between the encounter of the archaeologist (or the craft of archaeolog

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Jun 02, 2009 James rated it liked it

More sciency-fictiony than I wanted. Not enough psychological destruction. Still the suffocating vision of the future is appeallllllllling.

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Dec 16, 2009 Mrowe73 rated it really liked it · review of another edition

There is a lot of Jungian stuff going on in this one that went over my head. It seemed towards the middle that the story was meandering and not really sure of itself. But at the same time it seems that the author really does have an idea of what he's doing and that helps you go along with the ride. ...more

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