Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

  
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
by Philip K. Dick
read: circa 2000
Guardian 1000 Novels

I read this back in college, but I had occasion to re-watch the movie adaptation (Blade Runner) again recently, as well as the belated sequel Blade Runner 2049. The latter movie got into the Dick-esque reality-bending mind-screwiness more than the former. 

A Scanner Darkly

A Scanner Darkly
by Philip K. Dick
read: 2017

Philip K. Dick's novels always mess with the reader's mind The mindwarping of A Scanner Darkly boasts another layer to it, as protagonist Bob Arctor falls under the influence of powerful drugs that fracture and destroy his mind. In the afterword, Dick reveals that he himself suffered from drug addiction, making this the rare semi-autobiographical science fiction novel.

The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch

The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch
by Philip K. Dick
read: 2016

Like most of Dick's writings, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch is a mental labyrinth, leaving the reader (and some of the characters) questioning who or what Eldritch really is and what he wants. Characters take hallucinogenic drugs and periodically plunge into realms where the lines between fantasy and reality blur. This is all par for the course with Dick, but Palmer Eldritch also possesses a beating heart under the mental gymnastics: protagonist Barney Mayerson is caught in a spiritual malaise and must find a reason to keep living in a universe where Earth and the other human outposts are largely uninhabitable. Mayerson must not only not preserve humanity, but determine that it is even worth saving.

Selected Stories of Philip K. Dick

Selected Stories of Philip K. Dick
read: 2013

A lot of themes run through Philip K. Dick's work. Below is something of a reference for his Selected Stories collection:

Dick as horror writer / There is a secret, hidden world happening parallel with our world that we aren't even aware of: "King of the Elves," "Imposter," "Roog," "Adjustment Team," "Upon the Dull Earth," "Precious Artifact," "A Game of Unchance," "Faith of Our Fathers," "Rautavaara's Case"

Characters don't know what reality is: "Imposter," "Precious Artifact," "The Electric Ant," "The Exit Door Leads In," "I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon"

Fatalism / Destiny: "The Minority Report," "A Little Something For Us Tempunauts," "Paycheck"

Memory / Manipulation of memory: "Paycheck," "We Can Remember It For You Wholesale," "The Electric Ant," "I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon"

Humanity creating things (especially robots) that it can no longer control: "Second Variety," "Autofac"

Ubik

   
Ubik
by Philip K. Dick
read: 2011
Time 100 Novels

After surviving an explosion, the characters in Philip K. Dick's novel Ubik find themselves dealing with an unknown threat disintegrating them one-by-one, and a world that seems to be crumbling around them. Or maybe they didn't survive the explosion at all? Dick is considered a science fiction writer, but I think he's as much a horror writer. Dick's brand of horror is insidious. Obviously we know there's no Freddy Krueger and there aren't zombies running around. But when Dick asks, "How do you know that reality actually exists and this isn't just in your head?," it's a horrifying sentiment that's more difficult to dismiss.

The Man In the High Castle

   
The Man In the High Castle
by Philip K. Dick
read: 2013
Guardian 1000 Novels, Hugo Award

Fatalism is a theme that runs through quite a bit of Philip K. Dick's work. "Minority Report" and "A Little Something For Us Tempunauts" are two examples. In the former, the protagonist creates a police branch that can prevent crimes before they happen by foretelling the future, and in the latter time travelers get stuck re-living the same stretch of time over and over. Both situations imply an overarching fate that people are trapped in.

The same device is present in The Man In the High Castle, an alternate-history fiction where the Axis won World War II. Several of the characters employ the I Ching to help guide their actions and predict the success they will have in their ventures. World views are often expressed in terms of inevitability of outcomes; for example, the Germans are described as hastening humanity towards its inevitable destruction. Towards the end, the book almost breaks the fourth wall (through the introduction of a "fictional" book-within-a-book where the Allies won WWII), and the narrative hand of Dick himself adds a level of fatalism over the entire novel.