Considered Philip K. Dick’s greatest novel when first published in 1962, this mind-bending work redefined the sci-fi genre. In it Dick conjured a new vision of our world – a twisted simulacrum of modern history in which the Axis Powers have won the Second World War. America is now divided: the eastern United States is a puppet of the German Reich – a regime of madness and brutality – while the western Pacific seaboard is governed by a militaristic, yet spiritual, Japanese dictatorship. Amongst the complexities of this new existence, a group of seemingly unremarkable people play out their everyday lives. As their narratives intersect, Dick poses larger metaphysical questions concerning the authentication of history, perception and the building blocks of destiny.

The Man in the High Castle is considered to be Dick’s greatest novel, and was awarded the Hugo Award in 1963. With it, he jettisoned the traditional trappings of science fiction that had defined much of his previous work. Gone were the spaceships, strange worlds and telepaths; what remained were the ideas that had begun to set him apart as a significant thinker of the age. As Ursula K. Le Guin discusses in her new introduction, the text’s innovation and skill took some of the first steps in dismantling the traditional barriers between science and mainstream fiction: it would become ‘the first big, lasting contribution science fiction made to American literature’.

This edition features the work of Shanghai-born Shan Jiang. His graphic images, strongly influenced by manga and comic book art, channel the text’s melding of cultures.