Confessions of a Crap Artist
Written in 1959 but not published until 1975, Confessions of a Crap Artist would be Philip K. Dick's only mainstream novel to be published during his lifetime. This is the first mass market paperback edition in the U.S., the first printing published by Pocket Books, as a Timescape Book.
Softcover. First Pocket Books Paperback Edition. New York: Pocket Books, 1982. ISBN: 0671442139. #11004.
Fine.
Originally written in 1959, Confessions of a Crap Artist was one of Dick's numerous failed attempts to break into mainstream-fiction writing. It is mostly a character study of several people living in Northern California in the 1950s. Jack Isidore, the "crap artist", is obsessive compulsive and lacks basic life and social skills. He moves in with his sister Fay Hume and her husband Charlie, and their complex marital affairs become the focus of most the story. The novel consists of multiple narrative points of view, each chapter shifting from first person to third person perspective for all the main characters. Dick considered this book "easily the best of all his mainstream efforts."