Book Rec of the Day 3/3/2007

YOU’VE NEVER READ KURT VONNEGUT?

Kurt Vonnegut is an American legend. “Our strongest writer,” says his former student John Irving, “the most stubbornly imaginative.” His writing is gritty, singular, and bracing, and Slaughterhouse-Five is his breakout book. Released at the height of the Vietnam War, the book is inspired by Vonnegut’s experience as a prisoner of war in Dresden where he survived the firebombing in 1945 that killed some 135,000 people. Read it today, and you’ll see it’s as fresh and meaningful as ever.

SLAUGHTERHOUSE-FIVE, by Kurt Vonnegut (1969; Laurel, 1991)