Book cover of Bluebeard

Book description

“Ranks with Vonnegut’s best and goes one step beyond . . . joyous, soaring fiction.”—The Atlanta Journal and Constitution

Broad humor and bitter irony collide in this fictional autobiography of Rabo Karabekian, who, at age seventy-one, wants to be left alone on his Long Island estate with the secret he…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Bluebeard as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

In trademark Vonnegut fashion, Bluebeard uses humor to juxtapose the horror and violence of World War II. In this way, it is similar to Slaughterhouse-Five

However, Vonnegut skewers the art movement born out of the war’s aftermath: abstract expressionism. Bluebeard is the story of Rabo Karabekian (who first appeared in Breakfast of Champions), a war veteran and failed illustrator who accidentally found success as a contemporary of Rothko and Pollock. At the end of his life, he’s ready to unveil one final secret locked away in a damp potato barn.

From Theodore's list on Book starring tortured artists.

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Existential Smut 2 by Hapax Legomenon,

Stories, essays & dialogues about art, imagination & the erotic life. A young man named Charles writes a series of erotic tales, and his bookish friend Lisa offers light-hearted critiques of them.

Some stories feel like erotic meditations or random erotic moments in a young man's life. Others start with…

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