The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick Volume 5: We Can Remember It For You Wholesale

Excellent short story. The author is a master storyteller when it comes to identity crisis, and this story is no exception.

What if government assassin with wiped out memory is actually something more? Ending had me giggling like a kid :) it would make a wonderful Twilight Zone episode.

Highly recommended.

My favourites in this fifth volume of Philp K Dick's complete short stories are the epic 'The Faith of Our fathers', the almost moving 'Chains of Air, Web of Aether', the fascinating solipsistic philosophy of 'The Electric Ant' and the cleverly amusing 'Not by Its Cover', about sentient fur cover binding (from the infamous wub creature) that re-writes the contents of the books it encloses.

This is an excellent collection, with only a couple of stories really failing to make any impact on me ('The Eye of the Sybil' and 'Strange Memories of Death'). Each of the others has at least a couple of points to recommend it and most are at least very good. Philip K Dick, although not a stylish or fluid writer, has a talent for introducing show more extraordinary themes and ideas through his rather bland characters, and in the short story form he has no trouble drawing the reader quickly in to each new tale. This is a collection you can easily read cover to cover in a few days (as I did!) show less

I tried to give this a go but after the 4th or 5th story in which a protagonist comes to realise his psychiatrist and family are inducing a false perception of reality for him it all began to blend together. I suspect Dick was trying to excise his own demons in these stories.

4 stars for his imagination. He is just so inventive that it makes me gasp! Perhaps 3 stars for delivery which is not his strong point but works fine for short stories. And definitely 1 star for misogyny. Women are definitely a lower life form than robots and are given no inner life at all.

4 stars for his imagination. He is just so inventive that it makes me gasp! Perhaps 3 stars for delivery which is not his strong point but works fine for short stories. And definitely 1 star for misogyny. Women are definitely a lower life form than robots and are given no inner life at all.

These are really just precursors to his later novels, before he fully fleshed them out. They're not very good, but interesting to see how he developed these early themes.

Dick was a prodigious writer, and a compelling storyteller. His short stories are amongst the best ever produced by the genre, and this collection is proof. Running the gamut from comedy to schlock to horror, each one is enjoyable; it's wonderful to note that this collection is volume five - yes, that's right, four more books full of his stories! Yay!