I wanted to expand on the Three Stigmata a bit: it is way farther from reality than Dick’s other work, which is fucking creepy in how well it predicted our cyberpunk dystopia.
In a lot of ways it starts as the inversion of Electric Sheep, taking the same ideas and flipping the script on them. The eugenics subtext is brought out into full view, and the Mercer machine concept is inverted into a tool of capitalism and hedonism. But overall, the same themes are present, being explored from the other side.
Then about halfway through, something terrifying starts to take control of the narrative, and the last third of the book is bleak as fuck. I think it’s probably the most Dok Howl PKD story in some ways. There are no heroes, there is no Deus Ex Machina, and what limited benevolent power exists is stupid, weak, petty, and trying it’s goddamned best.
PKD can be awfully formulaic sometimes, his Gnostic take on reality is usually so heavy handed that you can guess a plot line before it happens, if you’ve read any of his other books. A Scanner Darkly is one of the ones that doesn’t lean too blatantly on the Gnostic conception of reality, and even there the plotline essentially boils down to the same thing.
Three Stigmata is something different altogether, despite using similar plot elements and near identical symbolism. Wild fucking ride.
