The Philip K. Dick Reader is a collection of science fiction

Science fiction

Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...

 stories by Philip K. Dick

Philip K. Dick

Philip Kindred Dick was an American novelist, short story writer and essayist whose published work is almost entirely in the science fiction genre. Dick explored sociological, political and metaphysical themes in novels dominated by monopolistic corporations, authoritarian governments and altered...

. It was first published by Citadel Twilight in 1997. Many of the stories had originally appeared in the magazines If

If (magazine)

If was an American science fiction magazine launched in March 1952 by Quinn Publications, owned by James L. Quinn. Quinn hired Paul W. Fairman to be the first editor, but early circulation figures were disappointing, and Quinn fired Fairman after only three issues. Quinn then took over the...

, Science Fiction Adventures, Science Fiction Stories, Orbit, Fantasy and Science Fiction, Imagination

Imagination (magazine)

Imagination was an American fantasy and science fiction magazine first published in October 1950 by Raymond Palmer's Clark Publishing Company. The magazine was sold almost immediately to Greenleaf Publishing Company, owned by William Hamling, who published and edited it from the third issue,...

, Future, Galaxy Science Fiction

Galaxy Science Fiction

Galaxy Science Fiction was an American digest-size science fiction magazine, published from 1950 to 1980. It was founded by an Italian company, World Editions, which was looking to break in to the American market. World Editions hired as editor H. L...

, Beyond Fantasy Fiction

Beyond Fantasy Fiction

Beyond Fantasy Fiction was a US fantasy fiction magazine edited by H. L. Gold, with only ten issues published from 1953 to 1955. The last two issues carried the cover title of Beyond Fiction, but the publication's name for copyright purposes remained as before.Although not a commercial success, it...

, Satellite, Imaginative Tales, Fantastic Universe

Fantastic Universe

Fantastic Universe was a U.S. science fiction magazine which began publishing in the 1950s. It ran for 69 issues, from June 1953 to March 1960, under two different publishers. It was part of the explosion of science fiction magazine publishing in the 1950s in the United States, and was moderately...

and Space Science Fiction

Space Science Fiction

Space Science Fiction was a science fiction magazine published by Space Publications, Inc. of New York and The Archer Press Ltd. of London that ran for eight issues from May 1952 to September 1953. Space was edited by Lester del Rey and featured a monthly book review column by George O. Smith...

. It is identical in content and order to the edition of volume 3 of the Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick

Second Variety (1991 collection)

Second Variety is a collection of science fiction stories by Philip K. Dick. It was first published by Citadel Twilight in 1991 and reprints Volume III of The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick with the addition of the story "Second Variety"...

 produced by the same publisher apart from the substitution of three stories used in well known movie adaptations at press time in positions 21-23 of 24 and the omission of the end notes in the Collected Stories edition.

Contents

• "Fair Game
  Fair Game (story)
  Fair Game is a science fiction short story written by Philip K. Dick in 1953 and first published in 1959 in If Magazine. The story was re-published in the third collected volume of Dick's short stories, The Father-thing in 1987.-Plot:...
  
  " (1959)
• "The Hanging Stranger" (1953)
• "The Eyes Have It
  The Eyes Have It
  The Eyes Have It may refer to:* The Eyes Have It, a 1945 Disney animated short starring Donald Duck and Pluto* "The Eyes Have It", the first of the Lord Darcy stories by Randall Garrett* "The Eyes Have It" , by Ruskin Bond...
  
  " (1953)
• "The Golden Man
  The Golden Man
  "The Golden Man" is an 11600-word science fiction novelette by Philip K. Dick. It was received by the Scott Meredith Literary Agency on June 24, 1953, and first published in the April 1954 issue of If magazine. The story was illustrated by Kelly Freas in its original publication...
  
  " (1954)
• "The Turning Wheel
  The Turning Wheel
  The Turning Wheel is an 8,400 word science fiction novelette by Philip K. Dick. The Scott Meredith Literary Agency received the submission on July 8, 1952 and it was published in Science Fiction Stories No. 2, 1954....
  
  " (1954)
• "The Last of the Masters
  The Last of the Masters
  "The Last of the Masters" is a science fiction novelette by Philip K. Dick. The original manuscript of the story was received by the Scott Meredith Literary Agency on July 15, 1953, and the story was published by the Hanro Corporation in the final issue of Orbit Science Fiction in 1954. It has...
  
  " (1954)
• "The Father-Thing
  The Father-thing
  The Father-Thing is a 1954 science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick. The story, written from a child's point of view, concerns the replacement of a boy's father by a replicated version. Only the child sees the difference and has to recruit other children to help him reveal the truth...
  
  " (1954)
• "Strange Eden
  Strange Eden
  Strange Eden is a 1954 science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick. It tells of a planetary survey team that encounters an immortal woman on an uninhabited planet. The woman reveals that her race has visited Earth over the entire course of human history and were the inspiration for ancient gods...
  
  " (1954)
• "Tony and the Beetles" (1954)
• "Null-O
  Null-O
  "Null-O" is a 1958 science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick. This rather brief story examines the concept of totally unempathic and 'logical' humans in an obvious parody of the plot and concepts of The Players of Null-A by A. E. van Vogt. These beings view individual collections of matter, i.e...
  
  " (1958)
• "To Serve the Master" (1956)
• "Exhibit Piece
  Exhibit Piece
  Exhibit Piece is a 1954 science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick. The story is an early exploration of the concept of shifting realities, so common in the writer's fiction later on. The protagonist is a future historian of the 20th century and finds himself shifting in time from the future to...
  
  " (1954)
• "The Crawlers
  The Crawlers
  The Crawlers is a science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick. First published in Imagination magazine, July 1954 under the title "Foundling Home"....
  
  " (1954)
• "Sales Pitch" (1954)
• "Shell Game
  Shell Game (short story)
  "Shell Game" is a science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick. "Shell Game" was submitted to the Scott Meredith Literary Agency and received by SMLA on December 12, 1953. First published in Galaxy Science Fiction Sept...
  
  " (1954)
• "Upon the Dull Earth
  Upon the Dull Earth
  "Upon the Dull Earth" is a science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick, first published in November 1954 in Beyond Fantasy Fiction.-Plot summary:...
  
  " (1954)
• "Foster, You're Dead!
  Foster, You're Dead!
  "Foster, You're Dead!" is a 1955 science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick. It was first published in Star Science Fiction Stories No.3....
  
  " (1955)
• "Pay for the Printer
  Pay for the Printer
  Pay for the Printer is a science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick. First published in Satellite Science Fiction, October 1956.- Plot :...
  
  " (1956)
• "War Veteran
  War Veteran
  War Veteran is a science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick. It was first published in If magazine in March 1955.-Plot summary:The plot concerns an old man who claims to have travelled back in time from a future in which Earth has lost a devastating war to its own Martian and Venusian colonies...
  
  " (1955)
• "The Chromium Fence
  The Chromium Fence
  The Chromium Fence is a 1955 science fiction short story by Philip K. Dick, first published in Imagination magazine.The story is set in a future where political differences have been reduced to trivialities, the purists are pitted against the naturalists...
  
  " (1955)
• "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale
  We Can Remember It for You Wholesale
  "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale" is a novelette by Philip K. Dick first published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction in April 1966. It features a classic meshing of reality, false memory and real memory...
  
  " (1966)
• "The Minority Report" (1956)
• "Paycheck
  Paycheck (short story)
  "Paycheck" is a short story by science fiction writer Philip K. Dick, written on July 31, 1952 and first published in the June, 1953 issue of Imagination...
  
  " (1953)
• "Second Variety
  Second Variety
  "Second Variety" is an influential short story by Philip K. Dick first published in Space Science Fiction magazine, in May 1953. It is one of Dick's many stories in which nuclear war has rendered the Earth's surface an uninhabitable, gray ash pile, and the only things remaining are killer robots...
  
  " (1953)