The Man in the High Castle

By Philip K. Dick,

Book cover of The Man in the High Castle

Book description

'Dick's best work, and the most memorable alternative world tale...ever written' SCIENCE FICTION: THE 100 BEST NOVELS

It is 1962 and the Second World War has been over for seventeen years: people have now had a chance to adjust to the new order. But it's not been easy. The Mediterranean…

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Why read it?

5 authors picked The Man in the High Castle as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

This masterpiece from one of the giants of mind-blowing SF is best known as a canonical example of alternate history: set in a world where the Axis powers won World War II, and the former U.S.A. is divided between occupying forces of Imperial Japan on the West Coast and Nazi Germany. As such, the conflict in the book is really about the underground resistance forces’ efforts against the occupiers.

Lots of writers have played with similar premises, but I love Dick’s the most because of its narrative daring, from using the I Ching as a device to generate plot to…

From Christopher's list on a second American Civil War.

This was the first science fiction I read that played with the idea of alternate history, and it cracked my brain wide open when I was a youngster! But I’ve recently reread it, and it still has such power.

The book shows a world in which the Axis won WWII. But it’s a multiverse book, too, because, in the novel, there is evidence that a universe exists in which the Allies won the war. Evidence that must be stamped out. The reality that Dick paints in this novel is just so compelling and depressingly real. It resonates even now and…

I am a huge fan of alternate history books, and this was the book that started my love affair.

The author’s character and set building in this book was just brilliant. I’m not sure if PKD was the first to create the multiverse genre, but he is one of the greatest to have ever taken his readers on such a wild journey to them. The TV series was fantastic, but the book is a masterpiece.

Broken Mirror

By Cody Sisco,

Book cover of Broken Mirror

Cody Sisco Author Of Broken Mirror

New book alert!

Why am I passionate about this?

The books on this list have inspired me to expand the horizons of my imagination and to think boldly about the future. So often, it feels like we’re stuck living with our forebears’ bad choices and our leaders’ cynical and self-serving constructions of reality. In defiance, I write books for people who have struggled to fit in, who look around at our world and imagine how things could be better, and who want to read about realistic but optimistic futures. I write alternative history and cyberpunk to highlight how our cultural, technological, and political choices affect our future and how creating change starts with imagining it. 

Cody's book list on thought-provoking sci-fi novels set in vivid worlds

What is my book about?

A fractured mind or a global conspiracy? Uncovering the truth can be hell when nobody believes you… and you can’t even trust yourself. 

"A fantastic science fiction thriller with a sincere and important message.”—Kirkus Reviews. 

“A breathtaking, deeply dark alternate-history Earth with complex characters, layered worldbuilding, and twist after twist after twist.”—Julianna Caro, Reedsy Discovery.

Broken Mirror is the first volume in a queer psychological science fiction saga that looks at the stigma of mental illness and the hellish distrust and alienation that goes with it.

Broken Mirror

By Cody Sisco,

What is this book about?

Broken Mirror: the start of a smart, complex, and imaginative cyberpunk alternate history saga. Literary science fiction from a fresh, young voice.

In a skewed mirror universe, a mentally ill young man searches for his grandfather’s killer.

Someone killed Jefferson Eastmore. His grandson Victor is sure of it, but no one believes him.

Diagnosed with mirror resonance syndrome and shunned by Semiautonomous California society, Victor suffers from hyperempathy, blank outs, and sensory overload. Jefferson devoted his life to researching mental illness and curing Broken Mirrors like Victor through genetic engineering, but now that he’s gone, Victor must walk a narrow…


Now, you may be thinking – hey, that’s an alternate history SF. And you’re right, but in my view, alternate history is a subset of multiverse novels. Dick’s book relies on an interpretation of an idea in quantum physics which answers the paradox of Schrödinger’s cat. (You know, the one where the cat is both alive and dead in the box, until you look at it – and then it’s one or the other?)

The Many Worlds Interpretation (MWI) suggests that if the cat is alive in your world, it’s dead in another. There are two worlds because of that…

From Mark's list on multiverse to blow your mind.

This alternative history novel is a vision of what could well have been if things had gone slightly differently. The vision presented by the author is haunting because, throughout the book, you cannot free yourself of the thought that this could really have happened. It leaves you thinking about how easily your life could turn into a nightmare and how impotent you are to change the course of history. You finish the book feeling that you just dodged a bullet.

From Kfir's list on realistic science fiction.

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