I was pleased with this result.

[richardf8]

I am: Robert A. Heinlein Beginning with technological action stories and progressing to epics with religious overtones, this take-no-prisoners writer racked up some huge sales numbers.

Which science fiction writer are you?

I think I've read more Heinlein than any other SciFi writer.

Comments

[deckardcanine.livejournal.com]

Crud. I'm Philip K. Dick, and if you've seen certain LJ entries of mine, you know why that bothers me.

[richardf8]

No, I don't. I've never read Dick.

[deckardcanine.livejournal.com]

Let's just say his books tend to start out smart and riveting, reveal a couple flaws halfway thru, and then do something ridiculous to ruin the last quarter. Not always so, but I've given up on him.

I should be diversifying my SF reading anyway. I've seen no Heinlein, no Clarke in writing, one Lovecraft short story, and one Asimov novel.

[visservoldemort.livejournal.com]

Dick and Heinlein remind me of each other sometimes in their bizarre plot points, but Dick is more inclined towards distopianism, I think. A few years ago, I would've said he was Orwellian, but that was when I was a young idiot and all I knew of Orwell was 1984.

Incidentally, what do you think of Christopher Hitchens? He's rapidly becoming one of my favorite intellectuals.

[level-head.livejournal.com]

Horselover Fat, hmm?

Do you get the feeling that his works'd be better romps if they weren't so ... autobiographical?

===|==============/ Level Head

[deckardcanine.livejournal.com]

You lost me in both sentences.

[level-head.livejournal.com]

Ah. My apologies. In "VALIS" and some other related works Phillip K. Dick translates his own name to "Horselover Fat" -- that's the name of the main character. The description of the religious quests, divorce, drugs and jail time make you expect that these are events of Dick's own life.

===|==============/ Level Head

[deckardcanine.livejournal.com]

Apologies accepted. Some things are just hard to research by Google. :)

My personal experience with Dick's writings (as opposed to movies based on them) comprises The Man in the High Castle, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, The Penultimate Truth, and a short story called "Colony." Of those, only the first was basically good the whole way thru. I was going to give him a last shot with Now Wait for Last Year, but an LJ Friend told me it's the worst case of Dick losing interest in his own story near the end.

[level-head.livejournal.com]

This will give you a feel for Horselover Fat and VALIS -- it's a bizarre sort of fan-fiction, but quite close to the original in tone.

"Hussein’s restoration teams triggered a time dysfunction," Fat said. "Something they did there allowed the city to enter our time in its true form." (http://www.philipkdickfans.com/pkdweb/ReturnFat.htm)

===|==============/ Level Head