Mary and the Giant

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Mary and the Giant is an early, non-science fiction novel written by Philip K. Dick in the years between 1953 and 1955, but not published until 1987.

[edit] Plot

According to Lawrence Sutin's book, Divine Invasions: A Life of Philip K. Dick, (1989) the plot was as follows:

"A young woman comes to grips with her fears, ideals, and emergent sexuality in a small Northern California town of the fifties...Mary Anne Reynolds is Phil's most sympathetic female character prior to Angel Archer in his last novel, The Transmigration of Timothy Archer. Mary is twenty, thin, with brown hair and 'Straw-colored' eyes. Her father abused her, and now, coming of age, Mary wants much and believes little. She's frigid, but takes several lovers in hopes of finding a haven. Carleton Tweany, a black singer, initiates her into the mean old night world of the blues. Joe Schilling, the...record store owner who hires her and falls in love with her, is the 'Giant' of the title - too old, however, and lacking in the courage Mary requires...Losing Mary spurs him to greater self-awareness. The last chapter - a flash-forward blissful marriage to young bop pianist Paul Nitz - is utterly unconvincing."

The author himself once described the novel as: "A retelling of Mozart's Don Giovanni, with Schilling seduced and destroyed by a young woman." (Philip K. Dick: In His Own Words, By Gregg Rickman, 1984)

[edit] Trivia

The Joe Schilling character is virtually identical to the Jim Fergesson character from Gather Yourselves Together, Voices From the Street, Dr. Bloodmoney, and The Crack In Space. Indeed, both Schilling and Fergesson are based on Phil's onetime Record Shop boss, Herb Hollis. Hollis was the only actual boss Phil had prior to embarking on a career as a professional writer, and as such he served as an archetype for virtually all businessmen in all of Phil's novels.
In 1955, the publisher disapproved of the novel's original, downbeat ending, as well as Mary's interracial marriage to Nitz. Phil re-wrote the ending to be happier, and changed Nitz into a caucasian. The publisher was still unhappy with the book, however, and refused to publish it. The original ending is now lost.
Following Phil's death in 1982, there was a sudden rush to get as many of his known unpublished works out as quickly as possible. Mary and the Giant was published in 1987 after sitting rejected in a file for thirty-two years. It is regarded as one of his best "straight" (non-SF) novels by fans, though it has been criticized by Sutin and others for wasting much of its narrative on less-than-impressive characters.
Schilling and Mary Anne (With a different last name, however) later turn up in The Game-Players of Titan (1963), though Game is not really so much of a sequel as it is an author re-using characters he liked from an earlier, rejected manuscript.
Yet another version of Mary Anne shows up in Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said (1974) under the name "Mary Anne Dominic."