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Man in the High Castle

Philip Dick
Hugo 1963

James Bond style spy story flair wrapped inside an incredibly interesting depiction of a world twisted by reversing victors of World War II. Japan and Nazi Germany divide up the world, Japan gets the western US and Germany the east. And within this reversal, a mirror-image reverse of this story ­ a "fictional" depiction of the allies winning the war ­ exerts a powerful influence.

All this provides an intriguing and colorful backdrop for several intertwining stories: a long-distance love affair; the moral dilemmas endemic in the business world; the friction from eastern and western culture in direct, personal contact; racial and religious intolerance. Culminates in a hauntingly mysterious ending.

Two years before the first Nebula, a novel with style and substance on the level of books written in the 1990's. In fact, foreshadows one of the main themes in the 1996 Hugo winner, Diamond Age (a sentient book). This makes sense because many of the current writers were in their teens or early 20's during the 1960's. It reminds me of an old aphorism, "The reason we can see further than our ancestors is because we're standing on the shoulders of giants."

Interesting how The Blade Runner (Do Androids dream of Electric Sheep ?) is so much more well known and read than this while Man in the High Castle has so much more depth and creativity.

MJ and I Ching years before popular in the culture at large - another example of SF preparing us for the future.

Parental discretion: Challenging but recommended book for teenagers.

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