The final part of the so-called 'VALIS trilogy', The Transmigration of Timothy Archer, read (as with the previous parts) by James DeLotel. I found myself becoming steadily annoyed whilst listening to the opening chapters of this audiobook. It gradually became apparent, however, that this wasn't due to DeLotel's reading, as I'd first thought - as with VALIS and The Divine Invasion, DeLotel turns in a flawless reading here. No mean feat, when you consider the novel's narrator is a young woman. I was expecting at least momentary lapses of tone as he moved from male to female but there were none. At least, none that I could detect. Once again, DeLotel's calm tones belie the tangle of emotional and spiritual spaghetti Dick spins out.
Rather, it is that the characters themselves, for the most part, are a tedious bunch of self-regarding tools. Dick really makes you work at sympathising with this merry band, major and minor. From lifestyle guru Edgar Barefoot and his sandwich obsession, through schizo- / hebe- phrenic Bill Lundborg and his extensive knowledge of cars, to the bishop Timothy Archer himself (who is only happy when he's quoting something, it would seem), Dick's portrayal really shows how painful truth can be and how far people are prepared to run to avoid it. He also delivers the most hilarious undercutting of Christianity outside of a pissed Richard Dawkins - one which makes me, for one, wonder about all the other religions...
My one criticism would be that DeLotel's voicing does not, in this case, draw the listener into the relationships as it does with the other novels. This may be as much Dick's fault as DeLotel's, of course - but scenes such as that between Angel and Kirsten in the hospital did not elicit sympathy from me, rather the opposite - confirming characters' innate nihilism and despair, the leech-like behaviour the truly clinically depressed can have on those close to them. As with many of PKD's novels, ...Timothy Archer is an emotional and spiritual roller-coaster, one for which the voice of DeLotel acts as a simple 'push' - calmly rumbling on, while the listener holds their hands over their eyes and silently screams.
