278 pages
English language
Published April 19, 2010
The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch is a 1965 science fiction novel by American writer Philip K. Dick. It was nominated for the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1965. Like many of Dick's novels, it utilizes an array of science fiction concepts and explores the ambiguous slippage between reality and unreality. It is one of Dick's first works to explore religious themes. The novel takes place in a future 2016 where humankind has colonized every habitable planet and moon in the Solar System. To cope with the difficult life away from Earth, colonists rely on the illegal hallucinogen Can-D, secretly distributed by corporate head Leo Bulero. New tensions arise with the rumor that merchant explorer Palmer Eldritch has returned from an expedition in possession of a new alien hallucinogen to compete with Can-D.
Try to imagine how to implement virtual reality during a time when computers do nothing but manipulate text and numbers. Some drugs may be required (by the implementation). Now add Inception-style nested, shared hallucinations. Now imagine the first extrasolar being we encounter is a god who invades Earth via identity sharing.
