Ubik

Are you bored with writing yet another Philip K. Dick book review? Do you sometimes have a hard time distinguishing between PKD stories? Do you worry that everything that can possibly be said about PKD has been written already, even by PKD himself? Well fret no more! Perk up your PKD blog posts with a quick game that everybody'll love! With PKD Bingo, you'll make your point in the half the time, and without all those extra words. Your readers will say, 'Christ, I used to think your SF blog was only so-so. But now, wow! With PKD Bingo, I feel like I really know Dick!' And remember, blackout winners will receive a lifetime supply of empty aerosol cans!

Shucks. I didn't win blackout. But here are some notes:

• Ubik, as a plot device, is the ultimate in Handwavium/Unobtanium matter.
• The "Police Precinct And/Or Jail" box very almost got stamped, but Ubik saved the day. Boo.
• "The Wife" in this particular novel is actually very important and not annoying or naggy at all. She also isn't the wife of the protagonist, but the wife of his boss.
• PKD's sense of future fashion is far off the mark, but seriously, I'm surprised skirts haven't become popular among men yet. Pants are the worst on a hot summer day.
• The primary religious allusion is the Biblical story of "Balshazzar's feast." I'm pretty proud of this one, considering my Biblical illiteracy, but when someone like PKD writes a cliche like "the writing on the wall" (129), that's an alarm bell for me. (Then there's the repetition of "Sixty-two years" 134, 161.)
• That said, reading The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick will totally destroy any cracked-out religious theories you have about Ubik because nothing is as bizarre as PKD's own hierophantic revisionism of his work.

And yes, I will be playing BINGO in lieu of a review for every PKD book I read from now on. I suspect the unstamped boxes will be especially illuminating for each work. Feel free to play along at home. And remember... it's safe when played as directed.