The Dice Man - Luke Rhinehart

The Dice Man tells the story of Dr Luke Rhinehart, a psychiatrist who decides to make every decision in his life by dolling a dice. This way of living quickly spirals out of control, leading to all sorts of trouble.

Dr Luke Rhinehart is a successful psychiatrist, with a beautiful wife and two children. He lives his life in a structured and ordered way, playing by the rules and behaving as he is meant to. He starts of depressed, and looking for meaning, thinking there must be something more to life than the routine and order he has found himself in. One evening after a party, he decides if a dice lands on a one, he will go downstairs and rape his downstairs neighbour, wife of his business partner and best friend. It's a one. This is the start of what Luke calls his Dicelife, and from this moment onward he will consult the dice before most of his decisions in life, the only rule being he must obey what the dice tells him to do. Dicelife grows and grows, and enriches Luke's existence, bringing excitement and randomness into his everyday life. The way he explains it is that people have many motivations, battling inside of them, but most of the time we listen to only one. With the use of the dice, all of these motivations are given a chance to become realities, so the diceperson becomes a more whole person. Being a psychiatrist, Luke quickly passes on his teachings to his patients, and has to convince his fellow doctors that the therapy is valid and that it really does work,and that his new found eccentricity is not the symptoms of mental illness (although from the readers perspective this is up for debate). The idea of dicelife catches on, and becomes a phenomenon, even dictating how this book is written.

I think this little plot summary makes the book sound tasteless and obscene. It's not a horror book, or an overly graphic read. It isn't about shocking the reader or offending anyone. There are graphic moments, there is lots of sex and some violence - but that is not the point of the book. There is more going on here than just violence and sex. There is a number of themes explored here, mostly of course being freewill and determinism, but still there are more. The book explores if acting out of consideration and thought and logic is any more effective than just acting on random whims and impulses - instead of weighing up pros and cons of any decision, maybe we should just roll a dice, and roll with whatever happens. Luke's life falls apart due to his diceliving, but still he sticks with it - such is the enjoyment he gets out of living in a random way. Religion is a big theme in the book, and comes under scrutiny - the book doesn't explicitly state it's viewpoint on religion, but there are many comparisons with Dicelife and religion. Or more aptly, the followers of Luke and dicelife and the followers of religion. 

The book itself was written by the fictional Luke, and his dice. It flips from first person to third person, and from a traditional narrative to police reports or recorded audio. We have letters from fans and articles from magazines and excerpts from The Book of the Die. The story is chronological and easy to follow, the changes in styles are a nice touch which keeps the 550 page book interesting and fresh, rather than confusing the narrative. And of course, we get the sotry from Luke's perspective - are we reading the words of a madman?

This book was published in the 1970's and has enjoyed success since and has had a wide influence. Bands such a The Fall and Talk Talk have written songs about it (these are two of my favourite bands, one of the reasons I picked this book up). It has a strong case for being a modern classic, though I don't think it is widely viewed as one - maybe it isn't quite literary enough to be placed into that category. Though it may not be the most high brow book around, it is a very enjoyable one, and the 500+ pages didn't at any point drag on. I would recommend this book to anyone and everyone, if they have the stomach for the more grisly parts. Free will has been written about for a long long time, but here we have an original story on the theme. 

Have you read this book? Let me know what you think!