Clans of the Alphane Moon

Despite featuring mental illness, murderous rage, and suicidal despair as major plot elements, this is a light, fast-paced, and highly amusing romp. The protagonist is Chuck Rittersdorf, who works for the CIA writing scripts for simulacra (androids) used to convey pro-U.S. propaganda around the world. His wife Mary, a psychologist who ironically works as a marriage counselor, is divorcing him.The plot is outlandish. Mary is being sent to Alpha III M2 (the Alphane moon) to investigate the fate of the patients of a psychiatric hospital, Terrans who were abandoned decades ago behind enemy lines during the war between Terra and Alpha, and Chuck ends up there too through convoluted plot twists that include the CIA sending a simulacrum to the Aphane moon with Mary who is controlled remotely from Terra.But before that, Chuck is befriended by his neighbor in his new bachelor "conapt" building, a telepathic Ganymedean slime mold named Lord Running Clam, a large yellow mound who can ooze under doors. LRC serves as both a comic element and a wise buddy for Chuck. Another major character is Bunny Hentman, a popular TV comedian who Mary attempts to persuade to hire Chuck as a scriptwriter to increase his income and who proves to be a sort of mobster.Along the way, while not interacting with his wife at all, Chuck has encounters with three women of varying degrees of romance and lust, including an actress with enhanced mammaries who is the mistress of Hentman.On the Alphane moon, the former patients have organized into clans according to their condition -- manics, depressives, obsessive-compulsives, and several different types of schizophrenics including paranoid and disorganized. They govern through a council with representatives of each clan. The strangest of them are several of the schizophrenics who have developed supernatural powers and are considered saintly by the others.The ending involves both the fate of the clans and their new society, and the fate of Chuck and Mary. PKD suffered from mental illness himself, and the story conveys not only compassion for the former patients, but the belief that they should enjoy autonomy. It is the Rittersdorfs' relationship that is woefully undeveloped, and this is the major flaw in the novel. Other than that everything is pulled together quite nicely.*** *** ***This is not one of PKD's best novels -- it's not in the same category as The Man In the High Castle, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, or A Scanner Darkly. It's amusing, but not too ambitious or deep. PKD's mystical bent appears toward the end when Chuck makes reference to The Paraclete. "The Holy Spirit," Chuck said, [when asked what he is talking about], "It's in every man but hard to find." (194)And this oblique reference serves as a deus ex machina for the way things turn out between Chuck and Mary, lacking any actual character development that would explain it. If you blink you could miss it, unlike Taoism in the High Castle, or Mercerism in Do Androids Dream (a central feature which was completely missing from Blade Runner!).

Every high school student ought to read this book, and then turn off their portable devices and think about it for oh maybe as long as ten minutes and then attempt to verbalize what it's REALLY about. In the process, they might have some life altering insights into the society in which they live, not simply about life in the society which has evolved within the abandoned insane asylum on the Alphane Moon. This novel is classic PKD, full of his sly dystopian tropes. (All anyone needs to know about this author is that "You may be paranoid, but that doesn't mean They aren't out to get you.") Typically, PKD wrote in a hurry and he wrote for s/f pulp magazines, but Jonathan Swift couldn't be any more mordant and sharply observant of culture than this lately resurrected genius. The story does rush to the end and the characters begin to form and then fall flat--except for Lord Running Clam, the sentient slime mold--but what s/f buff really cares? PKD sets your mind spinning like a psychedelic top.(And the 4 stars is only in relationship to other s/f, not in relationship to the whole universe of books. Don't much care for "Valis;" my personal favorites are "The 3 stigmata of Palmer Eldritch" & the glorious "Ubik.")

Many Years Ago a friend recommend a book that he said was sort of crazy and was truly great. He gave me a beaten up paperback copy of The Clans Of The Alpha Moon. I loved it and lent it to some of my friends, who also felt the same way about it until I lent it to someone who loved it so much that I've never seen it again. This must have been about 30 years ago. All this time, this weird story has lived on in my head and I've told it to many of my friends and co-workers (my career choice had me work in a State Mental Hospital). I did not know that this was written by an author of note, nor was I ever able to find another copy of this book, which takes place on a moon of a planet that had been set up as a mental hospital. Patients were grouped into communities according to diagnosis and symptoms The place has been neglected for years and now the authorities have returned to take over. This tale is just too good for me to ruin with my rendition. Thanks to my next door neighbor who recognized this book and knew Phillip K Dick when I told him the story.

Great writing style combined with truly creative characters makes this novel a bright star in the PKD constellation. Read this.

In Clans of the Alphane Moon PKD presages breast implants with startling accuracy in a future much more like our own than many of his novels. Of course we have done better in his 1990's than we have ever hoped, not only tackling intergalactic travel but also winning a war against aliens, something we have trouble even imagining in our scifi nowadays. Despite the hard fighting and decisive actions needed to win a war, PKD sticks to his model, and my personal preference, of telling the story through a myriad of characters who's thoughts and feelings weigh more than their actions. The individuals who most closely fit the heroic description are quite sinister individuals, from scheming ex-wives, Terran Soldiers, CIA simulacra, and Manic Schizophrenics.I dont want to give it away, it is a tasty mix of Freudian philosophy, Darwinian evolution and Poly Sci, and is a fun and fast read. Paid by title and not by page, PKD makes quick work of this world, and leaves you wanting more. Luckily he wrote plenty.

The inmates of several mental institutions have taken over an Alphane Moon. Now that the war is over doctors go back to regain control of the institutions. The inmates have other plans. A wild erratic disjointed ride that ends up a good read.

A rather peculiar look into the different worlds of the mentally disabled. In this faraway colony which serves as a psychiatric asylum, clans are formed around a particular form of mental disability. An interesting foray by scifi genius Philip K. Dick.

PKD is God

There's a few different types of Philip K Dick books.... This one could be classed as bonkers! This is a good thing.

Brilliant!

great read and true to his style