Will I love Slaughterhouse-Five?

I listened to Slaughtehouse Five narrated by actor Ethan Hawke. Yes, a difficult story to experience, filled with profanity and the conjuiring of graphic images. But the writing? Brilliant. Sometimes, we're meant not to like what we see and hear, and Kurt Vonnegut's experience as a soldier who witnessed the destruction of Dresden during World War II is the foundation for fantastical story. His searing descriptions, unsympathetic characters, and cynisicm may belie his anti-war message. Many dislike Vonnegut's tome, and the book remains banned in some libraries. But I discovered a story worth my time and consideration. The classics, like… show more.

This was probably one of the most intense experiences with non-linear storytelling I ever had, and that did something to me I could not have predicted.

In fact, while reading this book, I started to turn the story into something of a philosophical discourse in my head. 

I really like how this book is at the same time utterly insane in parts—and I do say that with the greatest respect, it‘s the good kind of insane—while at the same time, it explores themes of dealing with earth-shattering events on a very individual level.

For me, the icing on the cake… show more.

The best book about war.

I knew Mr. Vonnegut personally; he spent over forty years thinking about this book and took over fifteen years to write it. Slaughterhouse Five is less than 200 pages. Only a genius could do that.

I have read it six times, and I will read it again as we soon enter World War III.

I was late discovering this book; I’ve read it twice now, but the first time was only about five years ago. I was shocked when I first read it; it feels as if PTSD has been distilled into book form.

The way the narrative bounces around, like an alarming reflection of a shattered mind, was quite an inspiring concept. I’m glad not to be Billy Pilgrim, who is brutalised and traumatised by unfathomable absurdities. Knowing that Vonnegut was a POW in Dresden, an event that kicks off the book, gives it an even darker edge for me.

Vonnegut’s book is a unique combination of satire, science fiction, and raw war critique. Billy Pilgrim, the protagonist, lives out the trauma of surviving the Dresden bombing by becoming "unstuck in time," drifting through different moments of his life, from past to future. This strange, nonlinear structure mirrors how we process trauma in fragments and waves, never in a neat, chronological order. The randomness of death, the meaninglessness of war—all these themes come together in a way that’s both absurd and deeply moving. As we witness terror and violence continually unfold across the globe, the echoes of Slaughterhouse-Five feel ever-present.… show more.

Maybe you’ve read this book, but maybe you haven’t. The kids like me who used to carry the 95¢ Dell paperbacks are now dead or thinking about it.

The author, Kurt Vonnegut, was an American prisoner of war and spent 24 hours underground in a meat locker during the Allied firebombing of Dresden, Germany. He said of his experience the bombing “killed 250,000 people in 24 hours and destroyed all of Dresden—possibly the world’s most beautiful city. But not me.” It’s fair to say that this book was his imagination’s way of dealing with the war. “One” acts as a… show more.

I first read Slaughterhouse-Five as a callow college student, concluding with the certainty of youth that this was a brilliant but weird amalgam of dark humor and sci-fi wrapped inside an autobiographical anti-war screed. However, my real ‘duh’ moment came after rereading the book decades later.

The opening line, “Listen: Billy Pilgrim has come unstuck in time” – tells you everything you need to know: It’s about PTSD, written from the inside looking out. Like Billy Pilgrim, I could see myself time-jumping and being abducted by aliens to escape the trauma of war. Interestingly, the term “PTSD,” the acronym for… show more.

When I say Slaughterhouse-Five is funny, people eye me like I’m a monster. But it is. The New York Times even has my back on this.

Is the novel also gut-wrenchingly tragic and horrifying? Of course. It’s one of the most potent stories ever written, and I’m not sure I’ve encountered anything whose biting satire eviscerates the absurdity of war (and of existence) so well.

Vonnegut balances humor and grief on the head of a pin: “Billy turned on the Magic Fingers, and he was jiggled as he wept.” 

I got hooked on Vonnegut after reading his short story, Harrison Bergeron. Most of his books straddle the genres of literary fiction and science fiction, with just enough information to make the science believable.

In Slaughterhouse Five, there’s a time travel element, but how it happens really isn’t as important as where the main character ends up. With some historical content about World War II, which is another subject I enjoy, this book will take you on an interesting ride as the character becomes unstuck in time.

I do recommend anything by Kurt Vonnegut.

Slaughterhouse-Five is my favourite book of all time, and the book I would most like to have written myself (if only I had Vonnegut’s skill and didn’t have to live through the fire-bombing of Dresden).

Dealing with the atrocities of war while throwing in a mix of aliens and time travel, and regularly breaking the ‘fourth wall’, it’s a novel that shouldn’t work... but works superbly because of that.

Hilarious and tragically sad, mind-bending but soundly logical, the story of Billy Pilgrim and how he is kidnapped by Tralfamadorians to be mated in a zoo with a beautiful movie star… show more.