Vulcan's Hammer

Philip K. Dick was born in Chicago on December 16, 1928, and grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. He began publishing short stories in 1952, mostly finding homes in popular science fiction magazines, but he had little commercial success until he published The Man in the High Castle in 1962. He followed with novels such as Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, Ubik, and Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said, establishing him as a writer of science fiction. Following years of drug abuse and a series of mystical experiences in 1974, Dick's work dealt more explicitly with issues of theology, metaphysics, and the nature of reality. He died in 1982 in Santa Ana, California, at the age of 53, due to complications from a stroke.