We Can Build You is a 1972 science fiction novel by Philip K. Dick. Written in 1962 as The First in Our Family, it remained unpublished until appearing in serial form as A. Lincoln, Simulacrum in the November 1969 and January 1970 issues of Amazing Stories magazine, retitled by editor Ted White. The novel was issued as a mass market paperback original by DAW Books in 1972, its final title provided by publisher Donald A. Wollheim. Its first hardcover edition was published in Italy in 1976, and Vintage issued a trade paperback in 1994.
The magazine version of the story includes a brief closing chapter written by Ted White and very lightly copyedited by Dick. The Amazing editor felt that Dick's text did not properly complete the novel, and so he sent a draft conclusion to Dick, expecting him to overhaul it. Dick instead approved White's coda as written and altered only a few words. This final chapter, which Dick later expressed disapproval over, was not included when the novel was published in book form.
Read more about We Can Build You: Plot Summary, Reception
Famous quotes containing the word build:
“For believe me!—the secret to harvesting the greatest abundance and the greatest enjoyment from existence is this—living dangerously! Build your cities on the slopes of Vesuvius! Send your ships into uncharted seas! Live at war with your peers and yourselves! Be robbers and conquerors, so long as you cannot be rulers and possessors, you knowing ones! The time will soon be past when you could be content to live hidden in the forests like timid deer.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)