Reviews

Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut

potatopineappleman's review against another edition

4.0

Good book, but slightly out there. Overall a great anti war book.

apage347's review against another edition

5.0

One of my favorite books of all time - A superb anti-war book; Vonnegut highlights the idea that those clamoring for war & violence are often separated from those actually participating in combat. The soldiers rarely fought for patriotism + the sake of violence, but rather happened to end up in the battlefield by sheer misfortune. The aspects of time travel in this book are extremely well-crafted; you are often left wondering whether the narrator is actually experiencing time skips/alien abduction or hallucinations resulting from his PTSD caused by the firebombing of Dresden.

I really admire Vonnegut’s ability to focus on the mundane and micro-elements of a character’s life and story just to counter it all by disposing of the character and writing “so it goes”

This one is a classic for me and will be highly recommended for the rest of my life

kristadee16's review against another edition

adventurous funny slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.75

spookyasia's review against another edition

4.0

3.5

scremily's review against another edition

challenging dark reflective tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

chrisu12's review against another edition

dark funny informative reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? N/A
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? N/A
• Diverse cast of characters? N/A
• Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

3.0

An interesting mix of historical fiction, mixed with elements of Sci-fi. The author himself was a survivor of the bombing of Dresden, which is a big theme in this book. He writes almost biographically about a survivor of the bombing, but then turns the story to a young man, who also survives the bombing, but gets unstuck in time due to it. From then on, he doesn't experience time linearly, but jumps from event to event, which also includes aliens. The story is a bit weird, but is perhaps itself a way to grasp the weirdness of an entire city, which is destroyed by the own, good side. The story is weird and fun at times, but also difficult to follow along with and has a narrative and a different kind of story, which makes it hard. But interesting knowledge and historical knowledge was to be found, I learned a lot and did some research myself while reading the book.

alisarae's review against another edition

My first time reading this, or any Vonnegut, and I had literally no idea what it was about before starting. I didn't get assigned books written after the 1950s in high school so I missed this classic. Although I din't usually like books with this type of story structure, I was interested and curious as I read through it.

The most interesting concept in the book is time. Billy Pilgrim, the main character, learns to time travel after being abducted by aliens and he experiences vignettes of his life out of their chronological order. These aliens, when they look at a human, do not see a being on two legs; they see a centepede with millions of legs that show all the moments of a person's life strung together. Billy's attitude towards the death happening continuously all around him is blasé ("So it goes.") because death is just one moment in a person's life--they are eternally alive in all the other moments.

Another thing Billy learns to do is experience events in reverse. There is a wonderful vignette where the bombing of Dresden is described this way, starting with planes sucking up all the destruction and putting it into metal canisters, where they are given to women in factories who then safely store the components deep in the ground. It's beautiful to imagine the world in this direction, heading towards goodness and healing instead of destruction.

ash_acoustic's review against another edition

funny reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

I didn’t really understand a lot of what was going on but still enjoyed reading this book. My first Vonnegut book, will be interested to try another of his novels.

mooseabs's review against another edition

5.0

I really liked this book and I can't put my finger on why.

abbyh2001's review against another edition

dark slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.75