The Penultimate Truth
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Narrated by:
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Nick Podehl
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By:
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Philip K. Dick
About this listen
In the future, most of humanity lives in massive underground bunkers, producing weapons for the nuclear war they’ve fled. Constantly bombarded by patriotic propaganda, the citizens of these industrial anthills believe they are waiting for the day when the war will be over and they can return above ground. But when Nick St. James, president of one anthill, makes an unauthorized trip to the surface, what he finds is more shocking than anything he could imagine.
©1964 Philip K Dick (P)2012 Brilliance Audio, Inc.Listeners also enjoyed...
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Mediocre Mother to Gravity's Rainbow and the Truman Show?
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On an arid Mars, local bigwigs compete with Earth-bound interlopers to buy up land before the Un develops it and its value skyrockets. Martian Union leader Arnie Kott has an ace up his sleeve, though: an autistic boy named Manfred who seems to have the ability to see the future. In the hopes of gaining an advantage on a Martian real estate deal, powerful people force Manfred to send them into the future, where they can learn about development plans.
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Performance
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Years ago, Earth and Titan fought a war and Earth lost. The planet was irradiated and most of the surviving population is sterile. The few survivors play an intricate and unending game called Bluff at the behest of the sluglike aliens who rule the planet. At stake in the game are two very important commodities: land and spouses. Pete Garden just lost his wife and Berkeley, California, but he has a plan to win them back. That is, if he isn’t derailed by aliens, psychic traitors, or his new wife.
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Game, set, match!
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For years, the third moon in the Alphane system was used as a psychiatric hospital. But when war broke out between Earth and the Alphanes, the hospital was left unguarded and the inmates set up their own society, made up of competing factions based on their particular mental illnesses. When Earth sends a delegation to take back the colony, they find enclaves of depressives, schizophrenics, paranoiacs, and others uniting to repel what they see as a foreign invasion.
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One of my favorite
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The Crack in Space
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When a repairman accidentally discovers a parallel universe, everyone sees it as an opportunity, whether as a way to ease Earth’s overcrowding, set up a personal kingdom, or hide an inconvenient mistress. But when a civilization is found already living there, the people on this side of the crack are sent scrambling to discover their motives. Will these parallel humans come in peace? Or are they just as corrupt and ill-intentioned as the people of this world?
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Relevant reading for 2020
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Post nuclear apocalyptic surburban middle class
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By: Philip K. Dick
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The Cosmic Puppets
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Following an inexplicable urge, Ted Barton returns to his idyllic Virginia hometown for a vacation, but when he gets there, he is shocked to discover that the town has utterly changed. The stores and houses are all different and he doesn't recognize anybody. The mystery deepens when he checks the town's historical records...and reads that he died nearly twenty years earlier.
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Remember Millgate?
- By Darwin8u on 06-21-16
By: Philip K. Dick
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Galactic Pot-Healer
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Overall
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Performance
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Sometimes even gods need help. In Galactic Pot-Healer that god is an alien creature known as the Glimmung, which looks alternately like a flaming wheel, a teenage girl, and a swirling mass of ocean life. In order to raise a sunken city, he summons beings from across the galaxy to Plowman’s Planet. Joe Fernwright is one of those summoned, needed for his skills at pot-healing - repairing broken ceramics. But from the moment Joe arrives on Plowman’s Planet, things start to go awry. Is the Glimmung good or evil?
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If You Like your Pottery & Gods Fractured & Funky
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Valis
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What is VALIS? This question is at the heart of Philip K. Dick's groundbreaking novel, the first book in his defining trilogy. When a beam of pink light begins giving a schizophrenic man named Horselover Fat (who just might also be known as Philip K. Dick) visions of an alternate Earth where the Roman Empire still reigns, he must decide whether he is crazy or whether a godlike entity is showing him the true nature of the world.
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Life changing
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When Dr. Jim Parsons awakens after a car accident, he finds himself in a future populated almost entirely by the young. But for the young to keep running the world, death is fetishized, and those who survive to old age are put down. In such a world, Parsons - with his innate desire to save lives - is a criminal and an outcast. For one revolutionary group, however, he may be just the savior they need to heal and revive their cryogenically frozen leader.
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Time's Second Arrow
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Two hundred years after a nuclear apocalypse forced humanity to flee earth, humans still remember the most feared warriors of that planet - the Paratwa. These are genetically modified killers who occupy two bodies controlled by one vicious mind. The legendary Paratwa named Reemul, known as the Liege-Killer, was the strongest of them all. Now someone has revived Reemul from stasis and sent him to terrorize the peaceful orbital colonies of Earth. Is this an isolated incident, or has the one who unleashed this terrible power announced a gambit for control over the entire human race?
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I remember this being better the 1st time I read i
- By Brien Corey on 06-03-22
By: Christopher Hinz
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Dr. Bloodmoney
- By: Philip K. Dick
- Narrated by: Phil Gigante
- Length: 9 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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What happens after the bombs drop? This is the troubling question Philip K. Dick addresses with Dr. Bloodmoney, or How We Got Along After the Bomb. It is the story of a world reeling from the effects of nuclear annihilation and fallout, a world where mutated humans and animals are the norm, and the scattered survivors take comfort from a disc jockey endlessly circling the globe in a broken-down satellite.
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Post nuclear apocalyptic surburban middle class
- By Michael G Kurilla on 01-04-18
By: Philip K. Dick
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Sten
- Sten Series, Book 1
- By: Chris Bunch, Allan Cole
- Narrated by: Jerry Sciarrio
- Length: 8 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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The first book in an action–packed new SF adventure series. Vulcan is a factory planet, centuries old, Company run, ugly as sin, and unfeeling as death. Vulcan breeds just two types of native: complacent or tough. Sten is tough. When his family is killed in a mysterious accident, Sten rebels, harassing the Company from the metal world’s endless maze-like warrens. He could end up just another burnt–out Delinquent. But people like Sten never give up.
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THE MASTERPIECE BY JERRY SCIARRIO
- By Professor on 10-31-12
By: Chris Bunch, and others
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Sixth Column
- By: Robert A. Heinlein
- Narrated by: Tom Weiner
- Length: 5 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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The totalitarian East has triumphed in a massive invasion, and the United States has fallen to a dictatorial superpower bent on total domination. That power is consolidating its grip through concentration camps, police state tactics, and a total monopoly upon the very thoughts of the conquered populace. A tiny enclave of scientists and soldiers survives, unbeknownst to America’s new rulers. It’s six against six million - but those six happen to include a scientific genius, a master of subterfuge and disguise who learned his trade as a lawyer-turned-hobo, and a tough-minded commander....
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The Yellow Peril as it was
- By Thomas Martin on 04-16-12
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Lilith: A Snake in the Grass
- The Four Lords of the Diamond, Book 1
- By: Jack L. Chalker
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 10 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Aliens are spying on Earth from one of the four worlds that make up the Warden Diamond. But it is impossible to send agents to any of the four worlds because of unique microscopic symbionts that make it impossible for visitors to leave the Diamond. Seeking a unique solution, each of the four worlds making up the Diamond is sent a person whose mind has been stripped of everything and who is now controlled by an agent of the Confederacy. Lilith is the first planet to be visited.
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A great series if read in its entirety
- By Onix Harbinger on 08-21-18
By: Jack L. Chalker
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Infinity Born
- By: Douglas E. Richards
- Narrated by: Corey Gagne
- Length: 13 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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When DARPA's billion-dollar program to create artificial superintelligence is sabotaged, US operative Cameron Carr is tasked with finding the culprit. He's been on high-stakes missions before, but this time the stakes are nothing less than the future of humanity. Because the race to evolve a superintelligent computer is on, and power players around the world will stop at nothing to get there first.
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Excellent ScoFi Mystery Thriller...
- By shelley on 08-14-17
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Game Changer
- By: Douglas E. Richards
- Narrated by: Joe Hempel
- Length: 14 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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What if it were possible to upload years of knowledge into your mind in hours? To become an expert in multiple scientific fields, become an MD, or learn several languages - in a single day? The benefit to humanity would be immense. But so would the danger.... Rachel Howard is a brilliant neuroscientist trying to make this capability a reality. But when she crosses paths with Kevin Quinn, a Secret Service agent desperately trying to kill the president, she finds herself at the epicenter of an insidious plot.
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Richards fills the seat of the late great Crichton
- By Brian on 09-22-16
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Legacy
- A Prequel to Eon
- By: Greg Bear
- Narrated by: Stefan Rudnicki
- Length: 15 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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In this prequel to Eon, Greg Bear continues to explore the possibilities presented by the asteroid Thistledown, a remnant of a lost human civilization. The Way is a tunnel through space and time that leads to other worlds, some more like planet Earth than Earth itself. It is perhaps the most formidable discovery in Thistledown and with it come disputes as to the nature of the Way and how it should be used. The Way can be reached only through Axis City, the only space station of Thistledown.
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Barely related to Eon and Eternity
- By David A. Kingston on 02-21-15
By: Greg Bear
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Quarantine
- By: Greg Egan
- Narrated by: Adam Epstein
- Length: 9 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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In 2034, the stars went out. An unknown agency surrounded the solar system with an impenetrable barrier, concealing the universe from humanity’s gaze. In 2067, Nick Stavrianos is hired to investigate the disappearance of a mentally disabled woman, Laura Andrews, from the institution where she was being cared for. Aided by a skull full of neural modifications, he follows her trail to the Republic of New Hong Kong, where an organization known as the Ensemble has uncovered Laura’s extraordinary secret: An ability that could transform the world.
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Fantastic Story Let Down by Narration
- By Julia Oberhardt on 12-09-13
By: Greg Egan
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Factoring Humanity
- By: Robert J. Sawyer
- Narrated by: Katherine Kellgren
- Length: 9 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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In the near future, a signal is detected coming from the Alpha Centauri system. Mysterious, unintelligible data streams in for ten years. Heather Davis, a professor in the University of Toronto psychology department, has devoted her career to deciphering the message. Her estranged husband, Kyle, is working on the development of artificial intelligence systems and new computer technology utilizing quantum effects to produce a near-infinite number of calculations simultaneously.
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Novel alien first contact
- By Michael G Kurilla on 05-28-12
By: Robert J. Sawyer
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What happens after the bombs drop? This is the troubling question Philip K. Dick addresses with Dr. Bloodmoney, or How We Got Along After the Bomb. It is the story of a world reeling from the effects of nuclear annihilation and fallout, a world where mutated humans and animals are the norm, and the scattered survivors take comfort from a disc jockey endlessly circling the globe in a broken-down satellite.
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Post nuclear apocalyptic surburban middle class
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Now Wait for Last Year
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Earth is trapped in the crossfire of an unwinnable war between two alien civilizations. Its leader is perpetually on the verge of death. And on top of that, a new drug has just entered circulation - a drug that haphazardly sends its users traveling through time. In an attempt to escape his doomed marriage, Dr. Eric Sweetscent becomes caught up in all of it. But he has questions: Is Earth on the right side of the war? Is he supposed to heal Earth’s leader or keep him sick? And can he change the harrowing future that the drug has shown him?
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Last/Best Self-help Book for Couples and Suicides
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Time Out of Joint
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Ragle Gumm has a unique job: Every day he wins a newspaper contest. And when he isn’t consulting his charts and tables, he enjoys his life in a small town, in 1959. At least, that’s what he thinks. But then strange things start happening. He finds a phone book where all the numbers have been disconnected, and a magazine article about a famous starlet named Marilyn Monroe, whom he’s never heard of. Plus, everyday objects are beginning to disappear and are replaced by strips of paper with words written on them, like "bowl of flowers" and "soft-drink stand".
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Mediocre Mother to Gravity's Rainbow and the Truman Show?
- By Darwin8u on 06-13-15
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Volume I: The King of the Elves
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The King of the Elves is the opening installment of a uniform, five-volume edition of The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick, expanded from the previous Collected Stories set to incorporate new story notes, and two added tales, one previously unpublished, and one uncollected.
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Fantastic stories!
- By Renee Tang on 04-18-17
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In Counter-Clock World, time has begun moving backward. People greet each other with "goodbye", blow smoke into cigarettes, and rise from the dead. When one of those rising dead is the famous and powerful prophet Anarch Peak, a number of groups start a mad scramble to find him first - but their motives are not exactly benevolent, because Anarch Peak may just be worth more dead than alive, and these groups will do whatever they must to send him back to the grave.
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Earth is trapped in the crossfire of an unwinnable war between two alien civilizations. Its leader is perpetually on the verge of death. And on top of that, a new drug has just entered circulation - a drug that haphazardly sends its users traveling through time. In an attempt to escape his doomed marriage, Dr. Eric Sweetscent becomes caught up in all of it. But he has questions: Is Earth on the right side of the war? Is he supposed to heal Earth’s leader or keep him sick? And can he change the harrowing future that the drug has shown him?
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Last/Best Self-help Book for Couples and Suicides
- By Darwin8u on 02-07-15
By: Philip K. Dick
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Time Out of Joint
- By: Philip K. Dick
- Narrated by: Jeff Cummings
- Length: 7 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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Ragle Gumm has a unique job: Every day he wins a newspaper contest. And when he isn’t consulting his charts and tables, he enjoys his life in a small town, in 1959. At least, that’s what he thinks. But then strange things start happening. He finds a phone book where all the numbers have been disconnected, and a magazine article about a famous starlet named Marilyn Monroe, whom he’s never heard of. Plus, everyday objects are beginning to disappear and are replaced by strips of paper with words written on them, like "bowl of flowers" and "soft-drink stand".
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Mediocre Mother to Gravity's Rainbow and the Truman Show?
- By Darwin8u on 06-13-15
By: Philip K. Dick
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Volume I: The King of the Elves
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Fantastic stories!
- By Renee Tang on 04-18-17
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Clans of the Alphane Moon
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For years, the third moon in the Alphane system was used as a psychiatric hospital. But when war broke out between Earth and the Alphanes, the hospital was left unguarded and the inmates set up their own society, made up of competing factions based on their particular mental illnesses. When Earth sends a delegation to take back the colony, they find enclaves of depressives, schizophrenics, paranoiacs, and others uniting to repel what they see as a foreign invasion.
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One of my favorite
- By M.Biblioswine on 05-06-21
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Eye in the Sky
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When a routine tour of a particle accelerator goes awry, Jack Hamilton and the rest of his tour group find themselves in a world ruled by Old Testament morality, where the smallest infraction can bring about a plague of locusts. Escape from that world is not the end, though, as they plunge into a Communist dystopia and a world where everything is an enemy. Philip K. Dick was aggressively individualistic, and no worldview is safe from his acerbic and hilarious takedowns.
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Báb's Treatise Between the Two Fern-like Sanctuaries
- By Darwin8u on 01-31-15
By: Philip K. Dick
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Vulcan's Hammer
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After the 20th century’s devastating series of wars, the world’s governments banded together into one globe-spanning entity, committed to peace at all costs. Ensuring that peace is the Vulcan supercomputer, responsible for all major decisions. But some people don’t like being taken out of the equation. And others resent the idea that the Vulcan is taking the place of God. As the world grows ever closer to all-out war, one functionary frantically tries to prevent it. But the Vulcan computer has its own plans....
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All Your Base Are Belong to Us!
- By Darwin8u on 02-08-16
By: Philip K. Dick
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The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch
- By: Philip K. Dick
- Narrated by: Luke Daniels
- Length: 7 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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On Mars, the harsh climate could make any colonist turn to drugs to escape a dead-end existence. Especially when the drug is Can-D, which transports its users into the idyllic world of a Barbie-esque character named Perky Pat. When the mysterious Palmer Eldritch arrives with a new drug called Chew-Z, he offers a more addictive experience, one that might bring the user closer to God. But in a world where everyone is tripping, no promises can be taken at face value.
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Fantastic and current
- By Jerry Witt on 12-20-15
By: Philip K. Dick
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Martian Time-Slip
- By: Philip K. Dick
- Narrated by: Jeff Cummings
- Length: 9 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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On an arid Mars, local bigwigs compete with Earth-bound interlopers to buy up land before the Un develops it and its value skyrockets. Martian Union leader Arnie Kott has an ace up his sleeve, though: an autistic boy named Manfred who seems to have the ability to see the future. In the hopes of gaining an advantage on a Martian real estate deal, powerful people force Manfred to send them into the future, where they can learn about development plans.
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Autism, schizophrenia, and Martians
- By Darwin8u on 01-22-17
By: Philip K. Dick
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The Game-Players of Titan
- By: Philip K. Dick
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- Unabridged
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Story
Years ago, Earth and Titan fought a war and Earth lost. The planet was irradiated and most of the surviving population is sterile. The few survivors play an intricate and unending game called Bluff at the behest of the sluglike aliens who rule the planet. At stake in the game are two very important commodities: land and spouses. Pete Garden just lost his wife and Berkeley, California, but he has a plan to win them back. That is, if he isn’t derailed by aliens, psychic traitors, or his new wife.
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Game, set, match!
- By Darwin8u on 11-16-16
By: Philip K. Dick
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Confessions of a Crap Artist
- By: Philip K. Dick
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
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- Unabridged
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Jack Isidore doesn’t see the world like most people. According to his brother-in-law, Charley, he’s a crap artist, obsessed with his own bizarre theories and ideas, which he fanatically records in his many notebooks. He is so grossly unequipped for real life that his sister and brother-in-law feel compelled to rescue him from it. But while Fay and Charley Hume put on a happy face for the world, they prove to be just as sealed off from reality, in thrall to obsessions that are slightly more acceptable than Jack’s but a great deal uglier.
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The moods of the mass can't be fathomed...
- By Darwin8u on 05-21-18
By: Philip K. Dick
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We Can Build You
- By: Philip K. Dick
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In this lyrical and moving novel, Philip K. Dick intertwines the story of a toxic love affair with one about sentient robots, and unflinchingly views it all through the prism of mental illness - which spares neither human nor robot. The end result is one of Dick’s most quietly powerful works. When Louis Rosen’s electronic-organ company builds a pitch-perfect robotic replica of Abraham Lincoln, the firm is pulled into the orbit of a shady businessman, who is looking to use Lincoln for his own profit.
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Simulacra for me & simulacra for you.
- By Darwin8u on 01-15-16
By: Philip K. Dick
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The World Jones Made
- By: Philip K. Dick
- Narrated by: Christopher Lane
- Length: 6 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Floyd Jones has always been able to see exactly one year into his future, a gift and curse that began one year before he was even born. As a fortuneteller at a post-apocalyptic carnival, Jones is a powerful force, and may be able to free society from its paralyzing Relativism. If, that is, he can avoid the radioactively unstable government hit man on his tail.
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We can't destroy Jones
- By Darwin8u on 01-15-16
By: Philip K. Dick
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The Simulacra
- By: Philip K. Dick
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
- Length: 8 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Story
On a ravaged Earth, fate and circumstances bring together a disparate group of characters, including a fascist with dreams of a coup, a composer who plays his instrument with his mind, a First Lady who calls all the shots, and the world’s last practicing therapist. And they all must contend with an underclass that is beginning to ask a few too many questions, aided by a man called Loony Luke and his very persuasive pet alien.
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In a mad world, only the mad are sane.
- By Darwin8u on 12-09-15
By: Philip K. Dick
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Solar Lottery
- By: Philip K. Dick
- Narrated by: David de Vries
- Length: 6 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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In 2203 anyone can become the ruler of the solar system. There are no elections, no interviews, no prerequisites whatsoever - it all comes down to the random turns of a giant wheel. But when a new Quizmaster takes over, the old one still keeps some rights, namely the right to hire an unending stream of assassins to attempt to kill the new leader. In the wake of the most recent change in leadership, employees of the former ruler scurry to find an assassin who can get past telepathic guards.
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Dick's First Novel Seems All Grown Up.
- By Darwin8u on 03-21-16
By: Philip K. Dick
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The Crack in Space
- By: Philip K. Dick
- Narrated by: Benjamin L. Darcie
- Length: 6 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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When a repairman accidentally discovers a parallel universe, everyone sees it as an opportunity, whether as a way to ease Earth’s overcrowding, set up a personal kingdom, or hide an inconvenient mistress. But when a civilization is found already living there, the people on this side of the crack are sent scrambling to discover their motives. Will these parallel humans come in peace? Or are they just as corrupt and ill-intentioned as the people of this world?
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Relevant reading for 2020
- By Anonymous User on 11-06-20
By: Philip K. Dick
What listeners say about The Penultimate Truth
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Ryan A Culver
- 11-05-24
Excellent narration, thought provoking story
Very thought-provoking as are all PKD novels it seems, definitely worth the time to listen. Also excellent narration!
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- jane
- 04-05-19
Prescient and perfect for our times
I read this book 35 years ago and have thoroughly enjoyed it again as an audiobook, here in the era of ' alternative facts.' Well worth a listen. Hilarious, horrible and masterful.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Darryl
- 06-30-12
Not good for PKD
I enjoy PKD more and more but this one does not work. There are some good ideas but it's rather uneven. PKD is at his best when he's got the alternate reality stuff going as in Scanner Darkly which is excellent and Androids, and Policeman, and Valis. So far those are the standouts for me and i wouldn't hesitate to recommend those. I will keep going with him but it seems in general that his early stuff isn't quite there yet, and then later on he seems to be running 50/50, excellent alternating with confused. High Castle also great.
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- Christopher Boswell
- 07-30-23
Enjoyable story
Enjoyable story, had the background of alternate interpretations of reality and (current to today) the fake news
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- E
- 05-17-16
Captivating
Listened to it so quickly I might do it again, adapts perfectly and technology only corroborates the tale
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4 people found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 11-06-24
Classic Sci-Fi
love this book. everything i love about a dystopian future in one book. you can see where modern science fiction followed in it's footsteps, intentional or not. it's also got a tinge of reality relatable to 2024. not too far off. maybe we'll be here in a couple more decades.
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- Skyler
- 10-10-21
Just not all that great a story...
It had my attention for a good portion until the stuff about documentaries came about. Dude lost me about then.
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- M.Biblioswine
- 01-03-22
Good but not fantastic
This book definitely has its moments. I like but don’t love it. It isn’t offensive. This was from PKDs mature and productive period. It is kind of a blend of Defenders We and The Man Whose Teeth Were All Exactly Alike.
I have to mention that the voice talent is particularly good when reading this book.
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- Richard
- 03-21-12
Not One of Dick's Best
I've read or listened to about 15 of Philip K. Dick's novels and, unfortunately, this is not one of his best. The Penultimate Truth is basically an expansion of Dick's excellent short story, "The Defenders," which involves a dystopian post-atomic war society where Wes-Dem (Western Democracy) survivors live underground, informed by their government that the war continues and that the surface of the Earth is too toxic to allow long-term human survival. Beyond that, The Penultimate Truth involves a Wes-Dem president Talbot Yancy, who is really an artificial simulacrum programmed to read speeches written by skilled propagandists, called Yance-men. The main hero of the novel, Nicholas St. James, is the president of a densely packed underground housing unit, christened the "Tom Mix," who is coerced by residents to venture to the surface in search of an artificial pancreas necessary to save the life of the Tom Mix's resident mechanic. As in most Dick novels, there are various plot threads, conspiracies and eccentrics characters, but all in all the plot and themes seem a bit too thin to sustain a full length PKD novel. Newcomers to Philip K. Dick would be better off starting out with UBIK, The Man in the High Castle or Dr. Bloodmoney, which are much better books.
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- jason
- 06-07-16
Not the dick I wanted
I've read about 20 PKD books and this is the first one I was just unable to finish but to be honest it could of been the narrator. The part where he has to talk as an older man that can hardly breath is almost unlistenable had to turn it off it was pretty annoying. Although other then that his regular speaking voice was tolerable it was just that one characters voice.
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