The Broken Bubble

(inner flap of the book)

Philip K. Dick, the world-famous science fiction writer who died in 1982, was unable to obtain publication for the body of his fiction outside the genre. Since his death, however, a number of small presses have printed and sold out various of his unpublished works. Then Arbor House released his novel Mary and the Giant in 1987, and garnered such comments as “Philip K. Dick’s magic time machine ride into the 1950−s is just as amazing as his science fiction excursions into the future” (Ed Bryant); and “As enigmatic as a Beckett play, and at the same time as rooted in real life as a Steinbeck novel, Mary and the Giant is a weirdly compelling story” (Tim Powers); and “Boy, that guy was good!” (Suzy McKee Charnas).

Now Arbor House is proud to present The Broken Bubble, new and complete, for the first time anywhere, by arrangement with the estate of Philip K. Dick. Excitement has been building as the unpublished works of this intriguing writer have continued to appear, with increasingly widespread review attention and a steadily growing cult audience. And this is just the book to satisfy his fans and hook new readers.

The Broken Bubble is a novel of San Francisco in the 1950−s, about the unusual events that mix up and entwine the lives of four people at a turning point in American culture: the rise of rock-and-roll and the teenage life-style. Jim Briskin is a disc jockey on radio KOIF. He’s sill in love with his ex-wife Pat even though she’s about to marry someone else at the station-and she’s vaduating between them. But when he takes her to visit the desperate household of two of his teenage fans, she seduces the boy into abandoning his pregnant wife—who then claims Jim as her protector and support. And all around them the cultural upheaval of postwar American society is manifest, by teenage outcasts who have a remote-controlled Nazi automobile they use to bump into the rich kids’ cars; by Thisbe Holt, the dancer who performs for conventioneers by stuffing herself inside a clear plastic bubble; by blaring used-car ads and the conflict between generations. The solution to this human muddle is a literary triumph equaling in power Dick’s finest novels. Dick gives us a vision of redemption tempered with layered ironies and a lot of real humor. The Broken Bubble now takes its place beside the other major works of this fine writer.

Philip K. Dick was considered by many to be the greatest living author of science fiction. His work won many awards, including the Hugo Award for best novel.