American Writers (One Hundred Pages at a Time)

"Retreat Match" by Philip K. Dick is a really good story on false memories, shifting realities, and the politics of empire.

In the second hundred pages of "Pierre" by Herman Melville our hero comes to believe he has what he always wanted, a sister. What will be the cost of this realization? 

Time to go mad with Herman Melville as we begin looking at his 1852 novel "Pierre, Or the Ambiguities".

The conclusion to Philip K. Dick's "Counter-Clock World" centers on a failed rescue attempt at the Library, a forthcoming race war, and the question of how our hero Sebastien Hermes can find new meaning in life with the death of his wife and the near destruction of his business.

The Library has become victorious in stealing the Anarch. Can the various factions interested in him get him back before the Library can prevent him from writing any more dangerous books?

In this section of Philip K. Dick's "Counter-Clock World" we learn that the once-dead Anarch Peak still has something to say and that there are lots of people who will kill to hear what he has to say...or to eradicate what he has to say. Our hero's scheme to make a quick buck gets a lot of more complicated.

In "Counter Clock World", Philip K. Dick takes us to an Earth where time moves backward, knowledge must be destroyed, and the dead come back to life. At least these is still money to be made digging up graves. Beware the library.

The final part of my review of "The Zap Gun" by Philip K. Dick. Is it possible that a toy can stop an alien invasion?

In the second half of Charles Brockden Brown's "Edgar Huntly" we enter a world of brutal frontier violence as our hero finds out how easy it is to kill. It is one of the darker visions of the American frontier.

Things get even stranger in Charles Brockden Brown's "Edgar Huntly", a novel of frontier violence, sleepwalking, Indian isolates, and global adventurers.