Back Cover of Ace Double Edition
American Editions
From the inside flap of the Ace Double edition
When the sky fell on VirginiaTed Barton returned to his home town after several years only to find a strange city in its place. It had the same name, but that was all. And when he insisted that he himself had been a native, the folks there showed him his own death notice dating from the day he's originally left.
But stranger things where happening in Millgate, Barton saw transparent people walking through the walls! There were little clay golems running around like rats. And a web of terror was tightening around Barton himself.
But when he struggled to find out the truth behind Millgate's transition, he discovered that it was not just the town that was misplaced, it was the whole galaxy itself that was out of order.
From the back cover of the 1983 Berkley edition
Anytown. U.S.A. That's Millgate, Virginia, with its Central Street, its flagpole, its local bar. A town where nothing ever changes. Nothing at all. Until reality itself changes hands. . .
THE COSMIC PUPPETS
The unique genius of Philip K. Dick takes on a world of magic. where good and evil battle for dominion in a cosmic war that begins right here at home.
From the back cover of the Vintage 2003 edition
Yielding to a compulsion he can’t explain, Ted Barton interrupts his vacation in order to visit the town of his birth, Millgate, Virginia. But upon entering the sleepy, isolated little hamlet, Ted is distraught to find that the place bears no resemblance to the one he left behind—and never did. He also discovers that in this Millgate Ted Barton died of scarlet fever when he was nine years old. Perhaps even more troubling is the fact that it is literally impossible to escape. Unable to leave, Ted struggles to find the reason for such disturbing incongruities, but before long, he finds himself in the midst of a struggle between good and evil that stretches far beyond the confines of the valley.