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Cannonball Read IV: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick

By Alli | Posted Under Book Reviews | Comments (10)

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

I decided to read this book after reading a post on Pajiba about movies that would have been better with a different ending. I can’t seem to find that post or remember the exact title, but in any case it lead me to this book and I enjoyed it very much and I am now looking forward to watching my Director’s cut of Bladerunner as I think it has the better ending that Pajiba was referring to. I have never seen any version of Bladerunner but I had vaguely heard of it and knew it was something to do with a bounty hunter and androids .

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? is the story of a world ravaged by World War Terminus. The planet Earth is mostly abandoned since most have gone off to colonies on Mars where they are all promised their own personal android assistant (slave). Back on earth we meet Rick Deckard who is a bounty hunter working for the San Francisco police. Sometimes the androids tire of slaving for the humans and they kill them and flee back to Earth.

In this world there are very few animals and so owning an animal is a large status symbol and preserving any animal life is paramount. They all follow a mysterious man named Mercer, they hook themselves up to a device called an empathy box in order to visit Mercer and experience his plight. They seem to gain a group consciousness from this experience and it enables them to live in positive and peaceful ways.

When we first meet Rick he is fairly down. His wife is depressed, he is unable to purchase a real animal and has to make do with his electric sheep. He is the low bounty hunter on the totem pole and so his hopes to purchase an animal are few. He is quite obsessed with animals, they have a guidebook with prices and lists of extinct animals and he turns to it quite often. When a superior bounty hunter is severely injured by a new type of android, Rick is asked to take on the task of taking out 6 more androids that are on the loose.

He is first asked to meet with the manufacturers of the androids at their Earth headquarters. The police want to make sure that their test to determine if someone is an android is accurate. He then meets Rachael Rosen who he tests and who does play a substantial role in the rest of the novel.

It is mainly a book about empathy, and survival and what constitutes a life. Androids in this book are almost indistinguishable from humans, and physically can only be detected post mortem with bone marrow tests. The bounty hunters use mainly empathy response tests to determine if someone is an android as that is one thing that they seem to lack.

It was interesting to read a piece of Science Fiction from 1968. It is amusing that the author thought there would still be cathode ray tube TVs and that we would still hang up phones, and that there would be no cell phones either. Also it is referenced in the book itself that on Mars a big source of entertainment is old science fiction novels, they like to laugh at the inaccuracies as well.

All in all a pretty good read. I don’t read much science fiction, but this book made me want to possibly reconsider that.

For more of Alli’s reviews, check out her blog, Alli’s Cannonball Read.

This review is part of Cannonball Read IV. Read all about it.









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Comments

When reading science fiction (especially old science fiction), I think it's important to note that most science fiction authors do not claim to be predicting the future. Many times, they do end up predicting things, but this is rarely the intent. William Gibson, who coined the term "cyberspace" in his novel "Neuromancer," fully admits that his book -- which made quite a few potentially accurate predictions -- was actually about the society he lived in. More often than not, the writers are using a futuristic world (that is meant to be an exagerration of their own) to deal with the world in which they live.

That is why you shouldn't get hung up on the old-style phones and televisions. They have nothing to do with the overall themes of the story. As you said, "the book is about empathy, survival and what constitutes life." It's worth exploring these themes more deeply if you truly want to get out of the book what Dick put in.

Study questions:

1. Given that their importance is highlighted by their inclusion in the title of the novel, what do androids and electric sheep (animals) represent in the novel.

2. Comment on the parallels between the androids and the electric animals.

Remember: On the one hand, Deckard struggles to identify androids and "retire" them. His difficulties come from the advanced design of the androids, which makes them almost impossible to discern. On the other hand, Deckard lusts after the possession of a real animal, spending huge sums of money to purchase electric animals to keep up appearances in the meantime.

When you can no longer discern the difference between "real" and "fake," does any such difference really exist?

Posted by: Pfft at February 1, 2012 8:41 AM

Well put pfft. I agree that small inaccuracies don't factor in to the larger themes of the story but I found it interesting nonetheless especially as the androids referenced that they also were amused by inaccuracies in old science fiction. Also the last science fiction I read was Enders Game in which he pretty much had them using iPads so it was amusing to read about them hanging up phones in this book,

But I was definitely taken in by Deckhard's love for animals and I loved the heart at the center of this book.

Posted by: Alli at February 1, 2012 9:27 AM

I would recommend a lot of Philip K. Dick's other works, especially his short stories, which he's actually much better at writing. A lot of his stuff is social commentary wrapped with a science fiction setting, so it never becomes needlessly technological and all the 'devices' in his stories are metaphors for modern issues.

Start with Minority Report, that short story wrapped up so cleanly and so nicely that the movie will make you feel like you were cheated.

Posted by: Vi at February 1, 2012 9:43 AM

Lately the reviews for Cannonball Reads have me thinking that there is a hidden camera somewhere in my home, because so many of these books are novels I’ve been reading as well. Including Neuromancer. Spooky.

I loved Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep It’s the kind of book that quickly draws you deep into its world, moves along with a perfect pace, and ends while leaving a deep satisfaction. I really didn’t think twice about the televisions and phones. What did surprise me was my own gullibility at what happened with the toad at the end. It’s something that I would have never believed in other works, yet with the quick pace of the story, I never stopped to consider the reality. It was a disbelief and a shock that was a pure joy to me, as it has been a long time since an author was able to manipulate me in such a way.

Thank you for the review.

Posted by: Scully at February 1, 2012 10:25 AM

Scully I was also fooled by the frog. I really felt that the author painted a great picture of the world in this book.

Vi, I will check out Minority Report, is it the same story as the movie? I haven't seen the movie but it is an interesting concept for sure.

Posted by: Alli at February 1, 2012 11:35 AM

I must check this one out! I've been meaning to for a long time.

One of the best titles for a book ever.

Posted by: Jelinas at February 1, 2012 2:22 PM

Though I consider myself a PKD neophyte despite reading a short-story collection and several novels, the best one I've read so far is "The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch". Thematically, I think that novel is closer to the leitmotif of most of his works, especially his later ones.

Posted by: palaeologos at February 1, 2012 10:06 PM

"Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" is a great title.

"Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said" by Philip K. Dick is one of my favourite book titles up there with "The Still Small Voice of Trumpets" by Lloyd Biggle Jr

Dick has a number of fantastic titles, like "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale" - which was made into Total Recall with Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Posted by: Ender at February 2, 2012 6:10 AM

These are the articles that keep me coming back to pajiba. You guys really should focus more on this kind of stuff.

I also just started my foray into the world of Philip K. Dick (my first book is 'The Man In the High Castle').

Keep up with these kind of articles. This was fun to read

Posted by: PKD at February 2, 2012 8:29 AM

For some reason I thought AI: Artifical Intelligence was inspired by Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Granted, I know they're not entirely alike, but AI definitely pondered the question of what it really means to be human.

Posted by: LibraryChick at February 4, 2012 10:03 PM