Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?

I allowed the book to swallow me up the past few days: when I'm doing routines, I turn on the audio version and listen to the voice of the husky narrator on YouTube and when free, I open up my Kindle and regress to make sure I understand unclear portions from the audible. I was consuming the book with my ears and my eyes. That is how interesting it was to me. It pulled me in from the very first chapter.

To be fair to this novel, if you love science fiction and imaginative, it was easy to read. There are a few stumbling blocks however. Particularly those parts where it dabbled on existentialism and when hallucinations of the characters have become reoccurring.

Before reading the book, I watched the Blade Runner movies first. Yes, both the 1982-Harrison Ford and the 2017-Ryan Gosling sequel. Therefore, it affected my interpretation of the post-World War Terminus California. The setting in my mind was different from that of the novel. To me, it was a wasteland with a few pockets of modern civilization. A Mars-like world where animals are extinct. Perhaps a more civilized version of Mad-Max. Well, that's the beauty of books, you use your own imagination to fill-in the details.

*Anyway, for this review I have a questions which may spoil you. So here's a line I'm adding to warn you about possible spoilers.*

The first questions I have would be about Rachael and her role in the novel: what was the motive of Rachael to kill Deckard's goat? Also, why did she do it and let Iran (wife of Deckard) see her? My answer to these is that Rachael may have wanted to exact revenge for the death of her fellow androids whom Deckard killed. An eye for an eye, right?  I do not think it was the sex as this human experience has elevated her from the other androids -it made her feel human. As the androids in the book all desire to live further and ultimately, become and feel human, I do not think that Rachel would have despised this experience. 

The second wave would be on Mercer. Why was Mercer constantly reappearing to Deckard and to Isidore towards the end of the story? Was Mercer a god in the book? The spider and the toad, what do they represent?

I believe that there could be a profound divine meaning to these, i.e. Mercer was a symbol of hope and mercy in the novel. A sign of empathy that only humans have. This is why Deckard and Isidore, in their low points in the novel had visions of him. Now, is he a God? No. I do not think so as it was admitted in the novel that he is just a normal human being who was filmed to depict the man who is climbing the mountain when people sync with their empathy box.

The spider is a symbol of John Isidore’s life. He was used by the androids as the spider was tortured by them. The resurrected spider depicts his new life away from the androids. Though damaged, he is still alive.

On the other hand, the Toad symbolizes the acceptance and epiphany of Deckard that machines and living things have started to become alike, i.e. despite of discovering that the Toad was 'electric', he still cared for it and opted to keep it.

Just to sum it up, if you have watched any of the Blade Runner movies, this novel is nowhere near except on similar themes and setting. The book can be compared to the movie but they have to be consumed separately. Both are good.

If you are looking to read a good sci-fi book, then this is it.

P.S. I also read all of the graphic novels and I did a review of the 5th collected edition as it is where things get very interesting!

Children of Dune: A Review.

Having read Dune and Dune Messiah, books that challenged my imagination, I thought that this novel, a sequel of the two books, will be easier to understand. To my surprise, it was harder. The reason is that in this third installment of the Great Dune Series, Herbert not only recreated the world of Dune, but he also turned Dune's already profound system to a bewildering world of religion, politics and desert ecology.

At the end of Dune Messiah, the book which precedes this novel, Muad'Dib - the blind emperor left his palace and ventured into the vast desert bled. By doing this, he was considered dead according to Fremen tradition. His children, the twins Leto II and Ghanima, were then left under the care of Alia, his power-hungry sister, an abomination who is flogged by different personas in her memory... Arrakis, the dry desert planet, is now already becoming lucious and green with plants... Farad'n, the sole successor of House Corrino, is eager to regain their place in the universe... the religion Muad'Dib had created and left.. the Fremen... Melange. All these are key ingredients to the ever-evolving story of Dune which was presented in this magnificient work of Herbert's imagination.

Compared to other books that I have read, I was not able to easily turn its pages, this novel took a lot of my time and attention. It was very hard to fathom that there were times where I just had to put it down and read another book simply because I cannot understand the story anymore. So if you plan to read this book, I suggest that you do not, unless you have read the first two books of the Dune series.

And once again, what Frank had built in the beginning of the story, he destroyed at the end. Probably to pave a path for a new story line. Nonetheless, whatever the intentions of the author were, more of Dune's mysteries await to be unfold in the next novel, "God Emperor of Dune."

As for this novel's rating, I will just give it four stars out of five. Truth is, this book is a real keeper. In fact, I plan to read it again someday. So why not five? Because, I had a really hard time finishing the novel because of its twists and plots (but I wonder if its just me and my bad comprehension).

*As for the books of Frank's son, they are not as deep as the novels in the Dune Series. Moreover, there are a lot of incongruence in these "new novels." Despite of this, I still believe that they are entertaining though not as good as the books in the original series.