timeaisis's review against another edition
challenging
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
4.0
ferris_mx's review against another edition
4.0
Interesting meta take on an alternative WWII outcome. The writing was spare, which added interest. There's a lot I didn't get. All the I Ching stuff, and probably about half the author's message sailed right over. I don't even know why Abendsen was the pole around which the story spun.
enbyglitch's review against another edition
2.0
The idea of alternate histories and cosmological forces trying to maintain truth: fascinating and certainly impactful on science fiction as we know it today.
The language and ideas surrounding race in this book: close to unreadable.
Could be executed far more elegantly; hopefully the 2015 tv show did that to some extent.
The language and ideas surrounding race in this book: close to unreadable.
Could be executed far more elegantly; hopefully the 2015 tv show did that to some extent.
cbohne's review against another edition
hopeful
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
korben's review against another edition
dark
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
chanelson's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
caliesha's review against another edition
2.0
A couple thoughts about this one.
By looking at an alternate history of WWII, PKD shows the gravity of what actually occurred. I liked the theme of historicity throughout - looking at how certain objects regarded as "antiques" have no inherent value outside of the stories we place upon them. In doing some reading about PKD, I learned that he consulted the I Ching frequently while writing this book, making the Grasshopper-plot line even more meta. In his book about an alternate reality, his reality still exists. These elements (id est structure, world-building, theme) were great.
The biggest problem I think I had with this was that it lacked an emotional punch. I didn't feel connected to the characters, in fact, I was confused by their relationships at times and what the bigger picture was meant to be. It didn't help that the book just... ended. I get it that there couldn't be a big resolution for any of the problems, but I wasn't satisfied. It seemed that PKD cared more about his world than the people in it which left me, aka the reader, detached. Oh well.
Overall - 2.5 stars.
By looking at an alternate history of WWII, PKD shows the gravity of what actually occurred. I liked the theme of historicity throughout - looking at how certain objects regarded as "antiques" have no inherent value outside of the stories we place upon them. In doing some reading about PKD, I learned that he consulted the I Ching frequently while writing this book, making the Grasshopper-plot line even more meta. In his book about an alternate reality, his reality still exists. These elements (id est structure, world-building, theme) were great.
The biggest problem I think I had with this was that it lacked an emotional punch. I didn't feel connected to the characters, in fact, I was confused by their relationships at times and what the bigger picture was meant to be. It didn't help that the book just... ended. I get it that there couldn't be a big resolution for any of the problems, but I wasn't satisfied. It seemed that PKD cared more about his world than the people in it which left me, aka the reader, detached. Oh well.
Overall - 2.5 stars.
moirwyn's review against another edition
3.0
This review originally appeared on my blog, Books Without Any Pictures:
http://bookswithoutanypictures.com/2017/03/22/the-man-in-the-high-castle-by-philip-k-dick/
Post-election, I had a discussion with a couple of my friends about how we should read or reread some classic dystopias. I’d had The Man in the High Castle sitting in my shelf for a while, so decided to give it a whirl. For anyone unfamiliar with the premise, it’s basically an alternate history where the Nazis won World War II, the US was colonized by Japan, and the world in general has a lot more racism and repression. And yet (some at least) people continue to try to live day to day, and don’t know or consider anything else.
The Man in the High Castle is super meta–it’s an alternate history book, and there’s an alternate history book within the book called The Grasshopper Lies Heavy that each of the characters encounters. The Grasshopper Lies Heavy tells the story of a world where Hitler didn’t win. It isn’t quite the same as our own world, but it’s a vision of hope and what ifs for the characters, and helps them to see past the harshness of the world that they inhabit. It’s escapism, but also life-changing, in kind of a psychedelic way.
My feelings on The Man in the High Castle were mixed. The story itself felt jumbled and messy. There were too many characters, most of whom I couldn’t make myself care about. They felt so real–casually racist but yearning for a better world, most of them not at their hearts terrible people but instead are just people perpetuating a system that they were born into because they don’t know anything else, and taking that extra step is hard. And yet, I found myself not caring about their fates or their lives or what happened to them. While their stories intertwine, they aren’t particularly interesting people. And the intertwining of the stories is kind of a “so this happened and these people are connected” without them being part of any bigger story. Actually, maybe that’s my biggest criticism of the novel–it felt like a bunch of vignettes from characters whose worlds are intertwined rather than an actual story. The book doesn’t know what it’s trying to be–there’s are a couple spy plots, some relationship plots, some characters struggling to start a small business… but at the end of the day it’s all of those things and none of them. Then you get to the end of the book, at which point it gets all trippy and Inception-y and the fabric of reality starts to unravel leaving readers to wonder whether anything they just read is even real. And yet interspersed throughout the jumbled mess that is The Man in the High Castle were words and passages of beautiful writing that felt like they spoke to my soul. So that’s a definite plus.
That’s about all I feel like saying about the book right now, so instead I’ll leave you with a small anecdote of an incident that occurred while I was reading the book. As you know, I am a big fan of bathtub reading. So I pour myself a nice bath filled with chamomile and lavender scented bubbles, and I have my cup of tea and my book and I’m getting into the tub and OOPS. The book falls. The book gets soaked. I make a muffled yelp. Mike, from the other room, hears me and says, “What happened, are you okay?!?” and I respond by saying “It’s okay I just dropped my Dick in the bathtub and now it’s all wet” and Mike was very confused. Clearly I’m immature and have the sense of humor of a ten-year-old boy. Luckily, the book was salvageable and after drying for a few hours was a little wrinkly but very much readable.
http://bookswithoutanypictures.com/2017/03/22/the-man-in-the-high-castle-by-philip-k-dick/
Post-election, I had a discussion with a couple of my friends about how we should read or reread some classic dystopias. I’d had The Man in the High Castle sitting in my shelf for a while, so decided to give it a whirl. For anyone unfamiliar with the premise, it’s basically an alternate history where the Nazis won World War II, the US was colonized by Japan, and the world in general has a lot more racism and repression. And yet (some at least) people continue to try to live day to day, and don’t know or consider anything else.
The Man in the High Castle is super meta–it’s an alternate history book, and there’s an alternate history book within the book called The Grasshopper Lies Heavy that each of the characters encounters. The Grasshopper Lies Heavy tells the story of a world where Hitler didn’t win. It isn’t quite the same as our own world, but it’s a vision of hope and what ifs for the characters, and helps them to see past the harshness of the world that they inhabit. It’s escapism, but also life-changing, in kind of a psychedelic way.
My feelings on The Man in the High Castle were mixed. The story itself felt jumbled and messy. There were too many characters, most of whom I couldn’t make myself care about. They felt so real–casually racist but yearning for a better world, most of them not at their hearts terrible people but instead are just people perpetuating a system that they were born into because they don’t know anything else, and taking that extra step is hard. And yet, I found myself not caring about their fates or their lives or what happened to them. While their stories intertwine, they aren’t particularly interesting people. And the intertwining of the stories is kind of a “so this happened and these people are connected” without them being part of any bigger story. Actually, maybe that’s my biggest criticism of the novel–it felt like a bunch of vignettes from characters whose worlds are intertwined rather than an actual story. The book doesn’t know what it’s trying to be–there’s are a couple spy plots, some relationship plots, some characters struggling to start a small business… but at the end of the day it’s all of those things and none of them. Then you get to the end of the book, at which point it gets all trippy and Inception-y and the fabric of reality starts to unravel leaving readers to wonder whether anything they just read is even real. And yet interspersed throughout the jumbled mess that is The Man in the High Castle were words and passages of beautiful writing that felt like they spoke to my soul. So that’s a definite plus.
That’s about all I feel like saying about the book right now, so instead I’ll leave you with a small anecdote of an incident that occurred while I was reading the book. As you know, I am a big fan of bathtub reading. So I pour myself a nice bath filled with chamomile and lavender scented bubbles, and I have my cup of tea and my book and I’m getting into the tub and OOPS. The book falls. The book gets soaked. I make a muffled yelp. Mike, from the other room, hears me and says, “What happened, are you okay?!?” and I respond by saying “It’s okay I just dropped my Dick in the bathtub and now it’s all wet” and Mike was very confused. Clearly I’m immature and have the sense of humor of a ten-year-old boy. Luckily, the book was salvageable and after drying for a few hours was a little wrinkly but very much readable.