It’s a testament to how incredible this book is that I managed to jump right back into it after over half a year of having not continued reading it, for no other reason than I got distracted. It is such a memorable story that stands on its own from Ridley Scott’s iconic adaptation, Blade Runner. While his film is far more focused on the dreamy aesthetics of the story’s cyberpunk world, the book is more so involved with its characters and themes, tackling empathy between natural and artificial beings alongside human nature and whether something being authentic and “real” makes it any less important or effective.

I won’t lie and say that I fully understand the implications of the narrative threads and their endings, but I was definitely emotionally impacted by them. It sounds silly on the surface, but having autism I deal a lot with hyper empathy when it comes to animals and even inanimate objects, which definitely can affect me negatively and add to bouts of depression.

Due to my own experience, the whole element of the story around the material worth of natural and artificial animals and the relationship between them both had a profound effect on me. The chapter where Isidore became upset over the androids pulling the legs off of the spider he found was a standout moment for how relatable it was, especially when you feel the rarity of natural life as small as a spider in such a desolate, unnatural world so obsessed with destroying anything else that’s deemed unnatural.

I appreciated how many if not all of Philip K. Dick’s sci-fi concepts and contraptions all work in tandem with the themes, like the mood organ or the empathy box, both of which adding even more layers to artificial thought past even the presence of androids. It never feels too complex of a world either, using easily understandable concepts to create a layered and nuanced conversation with.

The story doesn’t resemble that of the film’s at all by the end, and the direction it eventually takes will stick with me for a good while. It’s more than worth reading if you’re a fan of the film or just a fan of sci-fi, and it’s imagery will be sure to strike you, especially those involving animals and Mercer. Justice for the goat.

Also, am I making shit up or did the mood organ kind of predict social media and their algorithms?