Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut

Slaughterhouse-Five is perhaps one of the most recognizable anti-war novels. I had blushingly never read this one before. It's one of Megan's favorite books, and she's tried to get me to read it for years. And now I have, and I'm so glad that I have.

Slaughterhouse-Five is Kurt Vonnegut's satirical tale of Billy Pilgrim, a World War II veteran who is "unstuck in time." What this means is that Pilgrim often disconnects from the present and picks up again at some other time in his life and usually at a different location. Pilgrim was in Dresden during the bombings, he was in Nazi concentration camps, he was at home with his wife, visiting with his recently married daughter, visiting with his son who was a green beret, being abducted by aliens and taken to the planet, Tralfamador, where he is put on display at a zoo.

I found this book to be quite powerful. It's a touching story at times, very light-hearted and almost humorous at times, and at other times just disturbing. It's a story that will always remain relevant in these days of war. It shows how powerful of a thing war is and the traumatic toll that it can have on the life of a soldier.

Vonnegut's writing style is amazing. I found myself asking "what makes a book a classic?" This book is the perfect example of a classic. It's a writing style that's totally in a league of it's own. The book flows so easily, yet there's so many complex connections made in it. Little tiny lines that stand out at first come back in a major way later in the book tying into the main plot. Vonnegut was a master of the American novel.

This book was read for the banned book challenge. I can see how this book would unfortunately be banned for so many reasons. Most of them to do with politics and war. There are probably some religious groups that have tried to ban this book as well for some of it's references to Jesus.

It's a sad thing that Kurt Vonnegut died recently. The world is a little less fortunate without him in it. He's contributed so many other classics to American Literature and I look forward to reading some of them. He's an author that will be missed by a huge number of fans...So it goes...

Remembering Vonnegut

Kurt Vonnegut passed away this morning at the age of 84. How sad. He had apparently fallen last week and suffered brain damage from the fall. Vonnegut is known as one of those great, classic modern authors. He wrote Slaughterhouse Five, Cat's Cradle, and Welcome to the Monkey House among many others. I haven't read any Vonnegut, but he was one of Megan's favorite authors along with Oscar Wilde and Yukio Mishima. And to be in the same boat as the other two make him something special. I'm reading Slaughterhouse Five for the banned books challenge, but was going to read Daniel Keyes' Flowers for Algernon next. Instead, I'm bumping Slaughterhouse Five up to the next spot in memory of Vonnegut. Though I haven't read anything by him yet, he'll still be missed. He's been an inspiration to American literature and to people close to me.

In other book news, I've decided to take a break from the challenges. I need to throw in a book to read just for fun (not to say challenges aren't fun). So I've decided that next up will be Colleen Gleason's The Rest Falls Away since it's the newest book in my possession and is not being read for a challenge. I'm so nervous that I'm not going to finish my challenges. Tolkien's new book comes out on April 17th, so I have to read that one and Brandon Mull's next book in the Fablehaven series comes out on May 1st. That still gives me plenty of time until the end of June, but I'm graduating and going to Mexico with Megan for the latter part of May and reading is probably not one of the things I'll be doing in Mexico. Though of course I'll bring a couple of books along. Jeesh...is reading supposed to be this overwhelming ;)