Ubik - Philip K. Dick Book Review

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Review Summary

UBIK is a book written by Philip K. Dick in 1969.

1992. There is a latent war going on between Glen Runciter, head of Runciter associates, an organization that tries to discover people able to see the future and Ray Hollis who employs such people. Runciter and a dozen of his best hunters are hired by Stanley Mick, a wealthy businessman, and must fly to Earth's Moon in order to find Hollis's men working amidst his employees. But this is a trap and Runciter is killed by a bomb. Joe Chip takes the leadership of the group and brings back Runciter to a moratorium. It's possible to communicate with dead people in such places ; they are maintained in a semi-life during years and are regularly awakened by their relatives as long as there is a brain activity in the corpse. But, from the moment Joe Chip and his companions have arrived on Earth on, reality seems to change, it seems to them that they have travelled time backwards until year 1939. Joe Chip will have to discover who is playing this mortal game with them. Soon his companions die one by one from exhaustion and Chip is contacted by Glen Runciter himself who informs Chip that he's alive and that, in fact, only the members of the group have died in the bombing. But is this really true ?

By far, the best Philip K. Dick book.
Daniel Staebler, Resident Scholar

Detailed literary breakdown of Ubik

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Ratings are on a 1-10 scale (Low to High)
Plot

Composition of Book
Descript. of chases or violence - 10%
planning/preparing, gather info, debate puzzles/motives - 30%
Feelings, relationships, character bio/development - 30%
Descript. of society, phenomena (tech), places - 30%

Tone of book - depressing/sad
FANTASY or SCIENCE FICTION? - science fiction story
Time Travel: - largely backwards/past
Spying & Investigations Yes
What is main char. doing? - finding a spy/saboteur
Time Travel story? Yes
Story largely takes place in - 1900-1960's

Main Character
Identity: - Male
Profession/status: - engineer
Age: - 20's-30's
Eccentric: Yes - deluded
How sensitive is this character? - sensitive to others' feelings
Sense of humor - Mostly serious with occasional humor
Intelligence - Smarter than most other characters
Physique - healthy but a geeky weakling

Main Adversary
Identity: - Male
Age: - a teen
Has magical powers? Yes
Magical/mental powers of main antagonist: - can change shapes - mind control
Eccentric: Yes - obsessed - deluded
How much of work is main antagonist actually present in: - a substantial amount
How sensitive is this character? - mean, arrogant
Sense of humor - Cynical sense of humor
Intelligence - Average intelligence
Physique - average physique

Setting
Which planet? - Earth's Moon
Earth setting: - 20th century
Takes place on Earth? Yes
Not Earth, in Solar System? Yes

Style
Person? - mostly 3rd
Accounts of torture and death? - explicit references to deaths
scientific jargon? (SF only) - some scientific explanation
How much dialogue? - significantly more descript than dialog

Most similar books to Ubik
Replay by Ken Grimwood
Transgression by Randall Scott Ingermanson
Ilium by Dan Simmons
Lest Darkness Fall by L. Sprague De Camp
The Shoals of Time by P. Orin Zack

Note: the views expressed here are only those of the reviewer(s).

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