After a world war has left destruction and a toxic dust on the planet, most of Earth's citizens have left for colonies in outer space where they have increasingly more sophisticated robots do their bidding. But whenever any of those robots forget their place and try to walk among the humans left on Earth, bounty hunters like Rick Deckard are there to find them out and "retire" them (aka, kill them).

This seminal work on science fiction was interesting, to say the least. The first two chapters were a little slow, but after that I got invested in it pretty quickly. There are several twists and turns that are unexpected and make the reader question what is going on, which I think helps to mimic what the characters are feeling as well. It certainly keeps things engaging with the reader wanting to continue on to see what happens next.

Sometimes I find older sci-fi titles to be a little underwhelming because the topics explored have been re-explored so many times since, and often by more adept authors. I didn't really find that to be the case here. I did chuckle several times at how Philip K. Dick could envision this world where there are colonies throughout the galaxy, hover cars, robots that are nearly indistinguishable from humans, and so forth and so on, but he still saw women primarily only as homemakers or secretaries. He could correctly foresee a world where there's a video component to phone calls, but still thought we'd need a central switchboard apparently. So, there are certainly signs of datedness.

But overall, I found the topics and themes being explored to continue being entirely timely and applicable today, even as we've passed the future date these events were set in (i.e., while written in 1968, this book takes place in 2021). The ethics around artificial intelligence are obviously key, but the subplots around cult-like religiosity and brain-numbing obsessions with celebrity/24-hour entertainment are also intriguing and thought-provoking. The author doesn't really provide any answers but leaves readers to keep mulling over these ideas long after they've closed the book. ( )

Still 5 stars after reading it again 30 years later. I won't lie, I didn't remember anything at all :-).
Which one is better, the book or the movie? I truly believe they complement each other. Two pieces of art which today are still more and more relevant with the debate around artificial intelligence.
Highly recommended short and entertaining reading. ( )

Bizarre. Imaginative. ( )

as somebody who is slowly dipping her toes in sci-fi books, this was fine. not great, but i did enjoy it. this started off very confusing for me and therefore i had a hard time focusing because i hate feeling dumb. then i got VERY interested in the story and had trouble putting the book down and was extremely enthused about the idea of what i thought was a plot twist - got disappointed by the realization that it was not... BUT i got very into the plot of the story and it was enjoyable. other thoughts.. i like Philip K. Dick's voice very much - the way he writes is fantastic. i just wish the first few chapters of the book were just a little longer so i didn't feel like i was missing something and feel like i was playing catch up ( )

Lovely dismal atmosphere, charmingly imperfect characters, but just not enough. It didn’t raise enough doubt for me. It didn’t stir my spirit enough. I guess it’s just because I don’t find it important to ask “What makes us human?� Why should we care about who/what is human/not? What makes humans so elite? It’s because we think we rule the world, when really we only have the ILLUSION of control. (/rant) But I guess the book leading me to this observation is just as important. ( )