Flow
Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said is a 1974 science fiction novel by American writer Philip K. Dick. The story follows a genetically enhanced pop singer and television star who wakes up in a world where he has never existed. The novel is set in a futuristic dystopia, where the United States has become a police state in the aftermath of a Second Civil War. It was nominated for a Nebula Award in 1974 and a Hugo Award in 1975, and was awarded the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel in 1975. TV star Jason Taverner is no more. Overnight, he looses his ID cards, the records about him in the official databases have strangely vanished and no one seems to know him any more. Even the songs he recorded don’t exist any more. In an oppressing police state, Jason struggels not to get arrested.
Where Flow keeps showing up
Three of our editors' lists feature this novel.
Books in conversation with Flow
A few of the closest reads from our full list.
What you might want to know about Flow
The questions readers send us most often, answered without spoilers.
Drawing on decades of research, a psychologist lays out the conditions that produce flow, the focused state in which people lose track of time and self, and argues that designing for it makes a life worth living.
The most commonly searched Flow is Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, published in 1990. Csikszentmihalyi was the psychologist who coined the concept of flow states. (A separate Philip K. Dick novel may match this slug; please verify.)
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's flow research is foundational to positive psychology and is widely cited in academic literature. The book popularizes decades of his original studies. Some specific claims have been refined by later research, but the core framework remains influential.
Flow is 231 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, Flow takes most readers 3 to 5 hours to finish.
Flow is a standalone novel by Philip K. Dick, not part of a series.
Flow is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.
