Note: before reading this review, you may want to consider the following: I liked the movie Blade Runner, and I thought it was superior to the PKD novel it was based on (Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?).

The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch (1965), a novel by Philip Kindred Dick (PKD), was written during what was arguably his greatest creative period (nineteen of his novels were published during the 1960s). The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch is one of the many I didn’t read when I was younger, but I’ve been hesitant to read any of his novels because I recently read two that I wasn’t particularly fond of: Martian Time Slip (about schizophrenia, which PKD was sure he had) and Ubik. Both novels were interesting, but they were written with PKD’s all-too-common  clunky prose style (I was expecting more, particularly since Time had listed Ubik as #46 on its 100 best English-language novels since 1923 …really?!).

Unfortunately, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch didn’t thrill me either. The novel is populated with cardboard characters who struggle through a typically disjointed PKD universe (a certain level of incoherence is purposeful, but the writing is rushed and ungainly. It is well documented that PKD wrote his 1960s novels while on amphetamines, although he insisted the drugs were ineffective). The novel leaves the reader with philosophical questions to ponder; but, for me, there is not enough depth to save the book from its pulpy prose. PKD churned out novels like there was no tomorrow during this phase of his career, and it shows. The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch is better than average PKD, but I’d only recommend it to readers who enjoyed Ubik and Martian Time Slip and want more of the same writing style and very similar themes (a search for identity and reality in a conflicted, confusing milieu).

There have been at least two PKD novels that I enjoyed: A Scanner Darkly and, in particular, The Man in the High Castle, which I thought was brilliant when I read it years ago (and I’m planning to reread it soon…).

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