I recently discovered Philip K. Dick and have read him voraciously. Novels like Ubik, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldrich, A Maze of Death, Valis, Now Wait for Last Year, Flow my Tears the Policeman Said, Time out of Joint, Dr. Bloodmoney, A Scanner Darkly, Martian Time Slip and The Game Players of Titan are examples of his novels that I really liked.
Since I love his type of fiction, particularly the aspects of the distorted nature of reality, hallucinations, drugs and paranoia; I am now looking for a similar-ish author with similar themes.
Whom do you have in mind that more or less resembles PKD?
The single complaint I have about his books is that they are so good but end too quickly, so if possible I’d like a 350+ page-ish recommendation(s).
Also they don’t HAVE to be Science Fiction, but I would prefer if it were Sci-Fi. I am already familiar with Pynchon, Foster Wallace, Borroughs et al.
Jonathan Lethem’s early work. He is or was such a fan of PKD that he has a Ubik tattoo. I particularly recommend “Gun, With Occasional Music.”
Unfortunately, he was sort of discovered by the end of the literary crowd that cooed over PKD for a while, and now writes Terribly Serious stuff, not that skiffy stuff fer kids.
Maybe some Keith Laumer like Night of Derlusions (1972)
What I said elsewhere (it was in an omnibus volume called The Long Twilight, with a dreadful cover)
Or Resonance (2007) by Chris Dolley is quite long and quite weird. Initially it starts with a postroom assistant with OCD but you soon realise that there’s a reason he has such a rigid structure to his life…
More recently, The Beautiful Land by Alan Averill
or Afterparty by Daryl Gregory, which I’ve just finished.
Or you could check out William Browning Spencer.
If you like comics, Matt Howarth is seriously weird; try the Post Brothers or Savage Henry.. It’s all small press b&w stuff.
And there’s a new graphic novel out in the UK called Transreality by Chris Lackey, which I finished last night and is maybe something to look at. It has a $ price on the back, so hopefully it’s got some sort of distribution in the US.
I don’t think most of the works by those authors comes very close to PKD - PKD is not just “weird” the way about half of Heavy Metal’s content is “weird.” Dick wrote about some deeply disturbing notions with terrifying insight… you don’t *want *to know how he thought of that stuff.
Most of the authors above are more in a generic “Whoa, dude, betcha I can blow yer mind” mold. Not the same thing at all. Ellison is in the middle: he had the insight and twist of PKD, but wrote at a more nakedly BYM level.
Good suggestions, thanks and keep them coming if possible!
Amateur Barbarian, of course PKD is weird in that way, that’s what makes him who he is, but even if the authors only have a loose family resemblance, if you think it’s in the same ball park, even if its located on the outfield or even in the stands, I’ll take a look!
It’s a fine shading, but I object to seeing Dick classified with lesser authors whose only ability was to be deliberately weird - kind of like classifying Stephen King at his “I can climb into the dark corners of your mind, hee hee hee” best with R.L. Stine.
If you’re looking for hallucination and paranoia, try Dhalgren (Warning: spoilers), by Samuel R. Delany.
Stephen King’s Insomnia has a world-behind-the-world plot that recalls one of Dick’s frequent themes.
Heinlein’s Stranger In A Strange Land shares much of the same vibe as Dick’s Transmigration of Timothy Archer.
This is going to sound snarkier than I mean it to, but if you like Dick’s outlandish ideas and have been able to tolerate the limitations in dialogue and characterization that plague much of his work, consider also reading Philip Jose Farmer.
I agree with those who say Phillip K. Dick is unique. I don’t read much science fiction anymore, but I don’t remember substantial similarities from any other author. At best you will find other creative authors with their own styles.
Given how the question was phrased, I think all my suggestions were reasonable.
Some are obviously less serious works than others but they all meet at least some of the requirements of the OP.
I suppose I might have said Kief Llama instead of Savage Henry though.
PKD apparently based a character in Valis on K W Jeter. Jeter was a pioneer in Steampunk, along with his friends Tim Powers & James P Blaylock. His most “Dickian” novel is Dr Adder which is strong stuff indeed. He’s also written Star Wars novels, *Star Trek *novels & 3 sequels to Bladerunner.
I haven’t read all his stuff but he might be worth investigating. There aren’t many “like” PKD…
(You didn’t list his The Man In The High Castle; it’s one of PKD’s best & somewhat different from the others. Only 2 of his novels ever had a real editor–it was one.)
The thing about PKD is that he married his weird plots to some really deep insights into the human condition, returning to the idea that empathy is what makes us truly human. As mentioned above, other writers may match his weirdness, but few capture the humanity at the heart of even his most poorly written novels.
I thought of Michael Bishop (who after all, wrote a novel subtitled Philip K. Dick Is Dead, Alas) and James Tiptree, Jr.
But I’m a bad one to ask. The New Wave SF writers I remember best from when I read SF are Harlan Ellison, Tiptree, J. G. Ballard, and (on the basis of one deeply emotional novel) Joanna Russ. And after that bunch, I guess I was in no hurry to let yet another such loon in my head. I really only know PKD from the movie adaptations and references in others’ writing.
. . .
As for Matt Howarth, yeah, it’s not PKD, and it’s mainly thin little comic-book stuff, but don’t completely knock him. His stuff with really alien aliens is brilliant. I like the “Harvest” arc in Albedo Anthropomorphics a lot. And Howarth’s weird guitarist Savage Henry is kind of a stoner cousin to PKD, in his way. (Maybe an anti-Dick. I don’t know.) Not that you can find any of this stuff now. Can you? I have no idea.
ETA: Screw it, I’m going to mention Parke Godwin, and stop.
I second J G Ballard, especially the disaster books like The Drowned World and The Wind from Nowhere. Zelazny’s Amber series might be good, since the universe is very malleable in them, kind of like in PKD books.
I put forth another vote for Harlan Ellison, as one of the best authors of our time, combining nicely twisted plots with a fluid writing style that makes them fun to read. Cordwainer Smith is amusing stuff, but nowhere near the raw weirdness of Dick.
I would second Smith, not really like Dick, but as another great author playing hi own game alone in his own playground.
William Gibson is a bit like some Dick. And Harry Harrison also comes to mind, as a rather comically bitter author. Allow me to suggest Bill the Galactic Hero.
If you do get in the mood for short fiction, any collection of Charles Beaumont stories would probably please you.
Beaumont is best known for his work for the screen (including quite a few Twilight Zone episodes), but some of his story collections are still available. “The Howling Man,” for example, has some great mind-bending stuff.
Harrison at his best (mostly short stories, especially the transfer-gate series, and the Deathworld trilogy) is pretty good. At his worst you have to wonder what his editor and publisher were thinking. BTGH and all the sequels have an interesting feature in that if you read the first letter of each paragraph, it spells out F-U-C-K-Y-O-U-B-O-B-H-E-I-N-L-E-I-N over and over.
If you don’t know him, you might enjoy Robert Heinline.
It seems to me that most people who would ask the question would either like him very much or not like him at all. You just never know.
But, here is his Wiki link. When I was younger, I really loved reading him. Now that I’m older, I don’t think I’d enjoy him as much. But I sure did love him back in the day. If you don’t know his work, I guess you’ll just have to try it and see.
Heinlein only wrote one or two stories that might remind the reader of PKD - the short story “They” is the only real candidate that comes to mind. Maybe one or two of the other early “weird” stories.
Anyone might like or dislike Heinlein on his own merits, but as far as this thread goes, he’s not a very good match for “writers like Dick.”
