Plot Summary
The novel is a day in the life of bounty hunter Rick Deckard, January 3/1992, as he tracks down renegade androids who have assumed human identities in a post-apocalyptic world where animals are rare and the human population has largely migrated off-world.
The entire Northern California area is the territory of the district’s senior bounty hunter Dave Holden. Deckard seldom works in it and does not consider himself to be either a peace officer or a full-time bounty hunter, but accepts the left-over cases that Holden either does not want or have time to pursue. On this day he learns that Holden has been hospitalized following his investigation into the recent escape of 6 Nexus-Six androids. Deckard accepts the bounty in order to give his life meaning and combat the ennui of his existence and lack of social standing; a recent realization brought on by the malaise of his wife and the social stigma of not being able to own an organic animal pet.
The novel begins with Deckard feeling alienated from his bed-ridden wife, Iran, who misuses her mood organ device, intended to keep the population in even temper, by dialing the depression setting daily. Later Deckard has a conversation with his neighbor Bill Barbour as they tend to their domesticated animals, Deckard owns a malfunctioning synthetic black-faced Suffolk ewe being unable to afford an organic animal, where he realizes that owning a real animal would give meaning to his life.
He travels by flying car to Rosen Industries in Seattle, Washington, to administer a bounty hunter "empathy test", a standard method for detection of androids posing as human in the form of a question and answer session, on the company's new Nexus-Six series. Deckard is introduced to and interviews Rachael who eventually fails the test by hesitation in reaction to what should be normal human responses. It is explained that Rachael is indeed human but lacks normal empathy due to being raised on a spaceship that was attempting to colonize Proxima before turning back.
Rachael attempts to bribe Deckard with the gift of a real owl but during the conversation he verifies his finding that she was Nexus-Six and that Rosen Industries was just trying to discredit the empathy test. Rachael had memories implanted and is not aware she isn't human, however it is later implied this was a ruse and that she knows her origin and is being used by the corporation to protect other androids from bounty hunters through sexual favors.
Deckard ponders on the meaning of humanity, morality and empathy following an attempt to retire an android opera singer. He is arrested and taken to be a police station where he is accused of being an android before escaping with fellow bounty hunter Phil Resch after deducing that the station was fake and staffed by androids. His moral quandary deepens after working briefly with Resch, whom Deckard first believes is an android but then learns is a particularly callous fellow human bounty hunter.
Deckard's story is interwoven with that of J.R. Isidore (a surname Dick also used in Confessions of a Crap Artist), a "special" (i.e. genetically-damaged) driver for an animal repair shop who cannot qualify to leave Earth due to his "special" status. Isidore's low I.Q. is due to genetic damage induced by radioactive dust, and he lives alone in an empty apartment building with little outside contact. Pris Stratton, an identical twin to Rachael Rosen, moves into the building and the lonely Isidore attempts to befriend her. Pris and her friends enlist Isidore to trap the bounty hunter chasing them down and Deckard recruits Rachael to help him. However Rachael attempts to use her sexuality on Deckard to distract him from his work. After Deckard confesses his love for Rachael she reveals she has slept with multiple bounty hunters and, with the exception of Phil Resch, was able to dissuade them from retiring their targets. Deckard is tempted to retire Rachael but instead tells her to return to Rosen Industries.
Deckard confronts the androids alone and succeeds in killing them, causing Isidore to break down from the loss of his only friends, and earning Deckard a citation for a near-record number of kills in one day. He returns home and his wife reports having seen Rachael Rosen kill his real pet goat. He understands that Rachael was taking revenge and is thankful that the loss is only financial.
He travels by car to an isolated sand dunes area in the state of Oregon to meditate and has an epiphany. He also finds a toad, thought to be extinct and considered to be Mercer (the supposed Messiah)'s favorite animal. Deckard brings it home, where his wife discovers that the toad is in fact synthetic. While Deckard is not glad, he 'prefers' to know that the toad after all is artificial.
Read more about this topic: Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?
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