Storyline: 3/5 
 Characters: 4/5 
 Writing Style: 4/5 
 World: 5/5 
 I feel that I know Philip K. Dick even though this is only my second book of his. I feel like I've always been familiar with him; he was such a literary icon for the subversive and rebellious bibliophile when I was growing up. That pop culture familiarity left me with three expectations: 
 1) It is going to be weird. Alternate universes, mind altering substances, distortions of reality - you were going to encounter something mind expanding. It might never make sense, might never conform or work according to any coherent logic or physical law, but it is going to be cool. 
 2) The guy is actually smart. Like, really smart. Uncanny and frightening insights, dystopias that are already realized, futures or worlds that show our present for the tragedy it is. This is someone who could write with the best, making you feel, fear, and yearn in just that way that only the revered wordsmith is capable. 
 3) Dick is going to take shortcuts. He didn't have the resolve or attention span to write long, developed works. He was too interested in the ideas and the weirdness to worry with extensive development or resolution. He knew he was a genre writer, that genre writing was an inferior product, and he was okay with that. He'd rather start another book than fill out the present one. 
 Rarely has an author or title so perfectly realized my expectations. This was weird and tantalizing in a way that challenged my ability follow and comprehend it. It was a comically tragic future that told so much about us today. I was embarrassed reading it - embarrassed for humanity, but I couldn't avoid reading on and further witnessing our humiliation. And it was underdeveloped, did have leaps of logic, sequences, and activities. These gaps and holes, however, added to the enigma. Characters and scenes should not occur this way! It simply doesn't make sense! But they do here and for reasons I'm not sure even PKD understood. He was awful with buildup and suspense, the actions scenes were terrible - but I was so tense reading this, shoulders tight and pulse racing because it was so unpredictable and heavy. PKD snatched me up into his future; I was living there and sharing the experiences of Rick Deckard. I was forlorn, optimistic, energetic, drained, emotionally confused, and intellectually mystified - all in a beautifully bleak world that came fully to life. 
 I appreciated Zelazny's introduction because it let me know that I'm not alone in finding it difficult to articulate what is so special about PKD. I was in full agreement when he concluded, "The subjective response, however, when a Philip Dick book has been finished and put aside is that, upon reflection, it does not seem so much that one holds the memory of a story; rather, it is the after affects of a poem rich in metaphor that seem to remain."