Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? is a 1968 novel by American science fiction author Philip K. Dick. Set in a future version of San Francisco in the aftermath of a destructive world war, the novel tells the story of Rick Deckard, a bounty hunter who makes a living by tracking down and killing human-like androids. Dick was already an established science fiction author by 1968; he won the Hugo Award for The Man in the High Castle in 1962, and he had written more than 30 novels by the time he published Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? The novel was nominated for the Nebula Award and was well-received by science fiction fans, although it did not receive mainstream attention until the film adaptation, Blade Runner, was released in 1982.

This guide was written using the eBook version of the 2008 Del Rey edition.

Plot Summary

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? is set in a fictional version of San Francisco that has been ravaged by World War Terminus. Nuclear fallout from this war covered Earth in radioactive dust. Most animal species are extinct, and many people emigrate to off-world colonies. Each colonist is given a personal android (a human-like robot) to ease their transition to their new life. These android servants occasionally rebel and try to flee to Earth, where bounty hunters are employed by the authorities to track down and kill them. Due to the extinction of most animal species, pet ownership is a status symbol. Live animals are extremely expensive, so many people make do with electrical, robotic equivalents. Pet ownership allows humans to demonstrate their empathy for other life forms, and in this world, empathy is key as it distinguishes humans from androids.

Rick Deckard is a bounty hunter. After his colleague is wounded while attempting to kill a new, advanced form of android, he is given a list of six androids who killed their masters on Mars and escaped to Earth. Deckard accepts the dangerous assignment, hoping to earn enough bounty money to purchase a real animal to replace his electric sheep. His wife Iran is depressed, and Deckard hopes that a real animal will help her as well as improve their status.

Deckard visits the Rosen Association, the android manufacturer, to learn more about the advanced Nexus-6 models. He meets Rachael Rosen, an apparent scion of the Rosen family. Deckard uses the Voigt-Kampff test (which measures empathy) to determine whether Rachael is an android. Though Eldon Rosen, the company’s owner, tries to trick and then bribe Deckard, the bounty hunter learns that Rachael is an android. Eldon worries that Deckard will order that android production be halted.

Deckard hunts for the other androids. After killing the first, he tracks down Luba Luft to an opera house where she is posing as a singer. Deckard is arrested by a mysterious, parallel police department; he soon learns that androids built an entire fake police department to help them hide in plain sight. With the help of another bounty hunter named Phil Resch, he kills one of the androids on his list and escapes. Deckard is told that Resch is an android but doesn’t know it, and he tries to hide the truth from Resch, who suspects that he might be an android. Together, they kill Luba and then Deckard runs the Voigt-Kampff test on Resch. He learns that Resch is human, though significantly lacking in empathy.

While Deckard hunts the androids, John Isidore lives a miserable existence. He is a special, a human who was poisoned by the radioactive dust, resulting in reduced mental capacity. He lives alone in an apartment block in the abandoned suburbs. One day, a strange woman named Pris moves into the apartment block. Isidore tries to befriend her and when her two friends Roy and Irmgard Baty arrive, he eventually deduces that they are androids.

Deckard uses his bounty money to buy a real goat. He worries that he now feels too much empathy for androids and cannot do his job. However, he must finish his assignment to afford the payments for his goat. Deckard uses an empathy box, part of a global religious movement that allows people across the world to share their emotional states, and practices empathy by engaging with a mysterious figure named Wilbur Mercer. At the same time, a television presenter named Buster Friendly reveals to the world that Mercer and his religion are completely fake. Friendly is an android.

Deckard is given the location of the three remaining androids. Before following them to Isidore’s apartment block, he meets Rachael in a hotel room. They have sex, and afterward, Rachael informs him that she has had sex with other bounty hunters to protect androids. After she sleeps with these men, they can no longer emotionally detach themselves from their work. Deckard declines to kill Rachael and proceeds with his assignment.

Isidore is horrified when Pris tortures a spider, and he tells Deckard where to find the androids. After worrying that he will not be able to kill Pris, who looks exactly like Rachael, Deckard kills all three androids. He returns home, where a weeping Iran tells him that a woman matching Rachael’s description killed their goat. Deckard flies out to the wasteland where he has a quasi-religious experience, emotionally fusing with Mercer himself. He finds a toad and excitedly takes it home, where Iran reveals that it is fake. As Deckard sleeps, she makes plans to care for the electric toad.