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A preliminary to Dick's masterwork, Valis, in which Phil appears as an explicitly named autobiographical character for the first time. Soon to be a major new film. As America gasps in the stranglehold of a skull-crushing totalitarian regime, a supernatural intelligence speaks from the stars...ARAMCHEK... the word scratched in the sidewalk of the President's childhood home.ARAMCHEK... the name of the subversive society 'with no official membership' whose sole purpose is to overthrow the American government.ARAMCHEK... the word printed on a book which contains the President's signature - a book in the hands of a Communist Party organiser.ARAMCHEK... the name of a woman who may hold the key - and who has only weeks to live.Will the agents of the omniscient Valis succeed in their mission of liberation? Or will the seek-and-destroy tactics of President Ferris F. Freemont extend the mind-numbing grip of the Antagonist across the parameters of the free world?In Radio Free Albemuth, his last novel, Philip K. Dick morphed and recombined themes that had informed his fiction from A Scanner Darkly to VALIS and produced a wild, impassioned work that reads like a visionary alternate history of the United States. Agonizingly suspenseful, darkly hilarious, and filled with enough conspiracy theories to thrill the most hardened paranoid, Radio Free Albemuth is proof of Dick's stature as our century's greatest science fiction writer.This prophetic novel of social control and political oppression is now to be turned into a major new movie starring Alanis Morrissette, which promises a provocative and edgy antidote to the summer blockbusters.
In a near-future America suffocating under the iron rule of a totalitarian president, a record store owner finds himself caught in a cosmic struggle between a celestial intelligence and a corrupt regime. Nick Brady, a man plagued by visions from an extraterrestrial entity known as VALIS, must navigate a landscape of state-sponsored surveillance and political paranoia. He is joined by an autobiographical version of the author, Philip K. Dick, as they attempt to decipher the meaning of the mysterious word ARAMCHEK. The narrative unfolds through a blend of personal observation and high-stakes political intrigue, forcing the protagonists to confront the reality of their own perceived sanity against the backdrop of a crumbling democracy.
This novel serves as a critical bridge between the author's earlier works and his later, more metaphysical explorations of reality. The text is often analyzed for its raw, unpolished energy, which distinguishes it from the more tightly controlled narratives found in his other major novels. Readers frequently note the unsettling relevance of the political climate depicted, which mirrors the author's own anxieties regarding social control and government overreach. The inclusion of the author as a character provides a unique, meta-fictional layer that invites deep scrutiny into the nature of the creative process and the author's own lived experiences. Ultimately, the work is viewed as a vital piece of the author's bibliography that captures his singular ability to weave complex philosophical questions into the fabric of a suspenseful, paranoid thriller.
Page Count:
286
Publication Date:
1999-01-01
Publisher:
HarperCollins Publishers
ISBN-10:
0006482856
ISBN-13:
9780006482857