Reviews tagging 'Suicide'

CATS CRADLE by Kurt Vonnegut

23 reviews

samspur's review against another edition

adventurous emotional funny sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

Wow, I’m surprised how similar this is to Slaughter House Five. Kurt does a great job of pulling you in with absurd situations and then wrapping it all nicely with a bow. So many quotable lines.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Racial slurs

Moderate: Suicide

ericispublius's review against another edition

dark funny lighthearted tense fast-paced

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

3.75

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Body shaming, Death, and Suicide

Minor: Ableism, Racial slurs, and Colonisation

wickedgrumpy's review against another edition

challenging funny informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character

4.0

I'm going to think about this one for a long time.

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Content Warnings

Minor: Addiction, Cancer, Death, Infidelity, Misogyny, Panic attacks/disorders, Sexual content, Suicide, Terminal illness, Toxic relationship, Violence, Xenophobia, Medical content, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Cultural appropriation, Gaslighting, Toxic friendship, Alcohol, Colonisation, War, and Classism

skimkaye's review

dark funny reflective fast-paced

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

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism and Racial slurs

Minor: Death, Slavery, Suicide, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Colonisation, and War

thesvnthsense's review against another edition

dark funny fast-paced

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

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Death, and Suicide

Moderate: Animal death, Child death, Misogyny, Racial slurs, and Racism

sunn_bleach's review against another edition

dark funny reflective fast-paced

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

3.5

Another one of those revisits from the mid-2010s when I was getting deeper into adult reading. I felt middling upon first reading "Cat's Cradle" in around 2015 or 2016. Upon this read, I get it a lot more, albeit it's still not my favorite Vonnegut. The parallels to MAD and nuclear warfare are more obvious, though it's clearly meant to be so - the man is angry. Vonnegut writes imperfect and unlikeable characters yet usually separate that from the author's voice (masterful in "Breakfast of Champions"), but here it's hard to separate the pseudo-nameless narrator from Vonnegut's own voice in the native sexualization and overuse of "midget". One can always say he's aware of this - especially since Newt gets it more than anyone else - but it's still jarring. The banana republic satire is similarly confused, at once sardonic toward the USA's involvement in the rape and pillage of those countries while also kind of playing it straight with McCabe and Bokonon.

Yet, as with some other mixed opinion reads this year, I still liked it. The ultimate "fuck you" to God at the end and mordant tendency toward fatalism is incredible. I had a friend who in his early 20s called himself a "Bokononist", and I see why.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death and Suicide

Moderate: Ableism, Animal death, Bullying, and Racism

technicolorxsn's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional funny reflective tense medium-paced

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

3.75

This book is the lightest of Vonnegut's novels that I've read so far honestly. I found it's engagement with faith very fascinating and somewhat adjacent to my own spirituality. I thought the concept of ice-nine was really cool and the exploration of its mechanics fascinating, even if it wasn't the core of the story.
(it's been a while since I've read it)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Death, and Suicide

Moderate: Racial slurs

Minor: Sexual content

abmochapman's review against another edition

slow-paced

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

2.5

this was mid, nihilism is overrated, and i think i do deadpan comedy better than vonnegut. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Ableism, Death, Racial slurs, Racism, Sexism, Suicide, and Colonisation

jordan_noel's review against another edition

challenging dark funny reflective tense fast-paced

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

5.0

Cat’s Cradle is a dive into the modern madness of humanity and its inability to remain in a peaceful state. There are contrasts between morals and science that prompt the question of why goodness is important when our nature leads us to destroy ourselves anyway. A demolished, war-driven world seems inevitable with these characters motivated almost solely by their individual interests. The main religion of a hopeless people is openly founded on lies, and yet it is the only religion that these people so devoutly serve. There are no comforts and there are no explanations. It is only chaos.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Death

Moderate: Suicide and Death of parent

Minor: Gore, Racism, Grief, Alcohol, and Colonisation

mordshunger's review

slow-paced

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

3.75

I finished this and gave it a 3.0. But I did keep thinking about it a lot for the next few days and I enjoyed those thoughts, so now it is a 3.75. 
It's a Kurt Vonnegut, so I expected a lot. I didn't get as much as I wanted. It's a bit long for a short idea, but the idea is fun. The "One day, all this will be yours" scene was the most memorable for me. The foot fetish is strong in this one and over all, I'd feel better about recommending this to anyone if Mona wasn't in it.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Suicide