The Cosmic Puppets
Author | Philip K. Dick |
---|---|
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Genre | Science fiction |
Publisher | Ace Books |
Publication date | 1957 |
Media type | Print (hardback & paperback) |
Pages | 127 |
The Cosmic Puppets is a science fiction novel by American author Philip K. Dick, published in 1957. It is a revision of A Glass of Darkness, first published in the December 1956 issue of Satellite Science Fiction.
The Cosmic Puppets was first published as a novel by
Plot summary
Ted Barton, having left Millgate, Virginia several years ago, returns with his wife Peg to find his hometown strangely transformed. Street names and landmarks do not exist as he remembers them, and the inhabitants of the town are similarly oblivious to their contradictory past. Peg proves intolerant of her husband's interest and abandons him while he explores the town.
While in Millgate, Barton meets three sympathetic locals: Doctor Meade, a
Christopher recalls an event entitled "the Change", which occurred eighteen years beforehand, after Barton had left Millgate. In his previous life he was an
Mary and Peter are in fact engaged in a low-intensity supernatural proxy war against one another. She can only use bees, moths, cats and flies against his control over golems, spiders, snakes and rats, and initially seems to kill Mary through his servitors. However, even this traumatic event is not enough to cause Dr. Meade to abandon the comforting illusion of his false human identity. Two vast, supernatural entities loom over Millgate, however, and Barton realises that Meade is one of them, as Peter Trilling reverts to his own, malignant divine self. He uses his servitors to attack Barton, Christopher and the Wanderers, but is stopped as Meade remembers his past, and reassumes his own divine identity.
At the denouement, Millgate finds itself in the crossfire of a battle between the twin but diametrically opposed demigods,
See also
External links
- The Cosmic Puppets title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
- A Glass of Darkness title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
- The Cosmic Puppets Review at The Open Critic
- The Cosmic Puppets cover art gallery