In a world where telepaths and precogs - mutants who can predict the future - are for hire, Glen Runciter runs an agency staffed by individuals with even more bizarre psionic talents: inertials, who can negate the abilities of the psi-powered. When Runciter Associates lose track of the top telepath managed by their commercial adversaries, the Ray Hollis organization, Glen decides to consult his dead wife (whose consciousness is kept in stasis at a Swiss moratorium) for advice. Meanwhile Runciter's top agent Joe Chip also has a bad start to his day when his door refuses to let him leave his flat because he cannot pay the toll. Visiting a client on the moon, Glen and some of his team are assassinated in an explosion. Taking command of Runciter Associates, Chip prepares to take on Ray Hollis's psi cadre but begins finding cryptic messages from his dead boss appearing in uncannily mundane places and begins to suspect that reality may not be what it seems.

Ubik is one of Dick's most exciting forays into the world of human perception, dealing with one of his key themes: how can we know if what we experience is real? Combining Descartes with pulp motifs, asking serious philosophical questions while mocking traditional SF by breaking off into descriptions of the ridiculous clothing the characters of Ubik always seem to be wearing, this mind-bending novel deliberately undermines our expectations of what SF is. Chapters are punctuated by ad-copy for an arcane, multi-purpose product called Ubik, whose possible use becomes clear as Chip and his colleagues slip back in time while the very universe itself seems to be degenerating. Dick later wrote a screenplay based on this fast-paced thriller, published only in a limited edition, which has sadly never been filmed, although features like Scanners and Existenz by director David Cronenberg reveal a clear PKD influence. Ubik is simultaneously accessible and challenging, a reality-twister whose exciting plot, harrowing ending and gleeful weirdness balance perfectly with a fundamental seriousness. Dick died in 1982, having produced some fifty books. He was finally recognized outside the SF field after his death. He is now a major cult author and, in all probability, the genre writer of the twentieth century whose work will endure and be admitted to the canon of mainstream literature. Ubik is just one of many masterpieces PKD produced, a book that is representative of both his finest and most typical works.

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