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<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4981.Slaughterhouse_Five?utm_medium=api&amp;utm_source=blog_review" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img alt="Slaughterhouse-Five" border="0" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/photo.goodreads.com/books/1165517166m/4981.jpg" /></a> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4981.Slaughterhouse_Five?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">Slaughterhouse-Five</a> by <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/998584.Kurt_Vonnegut">Kurt Vonnegut</a> 
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/13367168?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review"><h3>My review</h3></a>
 rating: 5 of 5 stars I've only just finished this, literally minutes ago - look I had no idea this was going to be nearly so good. When he died last year I read some of his short stories, which were okay, but nothing to write home about. This was something else. 
 
 A friend of mine I don't talk to any more by a strange form of mutual agreement / obligation (though, now I’ve worked out how this all works, perhaps we’ve found an alternative means of one way communication?) – was thinking of starting up a science fiction reading group for people who don’t read science fiction. Now, this is exactly the sort of book that would be great for that. 
 
 What I liked most about it was that the aliens did not have to be real – there was a bump on the head that could explain much. This is an interesting book and like many interesting books it can be read on many levels.
 
 It is an anti-war story that is both confronting and stunningly well written. I really loved the time travel sequences – how the novel told itself in much the same way that it wanted to explain what fourth dimensional living would be like. The structure of the story is very interesting – brilliantly clever. There is also a lot of very black humour – my favourite kind. 
 
 Every time someone dies in the book – and it is about (in part) the bombing of Dresden, so there are plenty of opportunities for people to die – the narrator says, “so it goes”. If you had asked me before reading this if I would have thought this would work as a device I would have said that it definitely would not – that soon it would be a pain in the bum. But I would have been wrong. It was inspired – catching me in much the same way every time and making the deaths more ‘real’ each time. Even when I knew they were coming their iteration was a mantra and one that worked for me in that it did focus my attention. This, even though the stated intention was to do the opposite.
 
 There is, of course, a logical flaw in the aliens seeing all times but making the same mistakes every time which isn’t really covered over by saying all times need to correspond to their inherent structure – but this is a novel and this was not a flaw that annoyed me enough to stop me reading.
 
 This is a humorous book, it is a book that stops you reading and makes you think of the implications of what you are reading. It is a book that is not seeking bland ‘realism’ – at no time is the reader unaware that this is art, rather than ‘life’ (whatever that is) – but this is its power – this is what takes the breath away. What is artifice comments on the real and shows it to as again as new.
 
 I really had not expected this book to be nearly as good as it was. It is one of those books I’ve always known was there, but thought it would be just another science fiction novel. This is anything but ‘just’ anything. A remarkable book I might force my daughters to read.
 
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/175635?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">View all my reviews.</a>

Trevor's review
rating:

I've only just finished this, literally minutes ago - look I had no idea this was going to be nearly so good. When he died last year I read some of his short stories, which were okay, but nothing to write home about. This was something else.

A friend of mine I don't talk to any more by a strange form of mutual agreement / obligation (though, now I’ve worked out how this all works, perhaps we’ve found an alternative means of one way communication?) – was thinking of starting up a science fiction reading group for people who don’t read science fiction. Now, this is exactly the sort of book that would be great for that.

What I liked most about it was that the aliens did not have to be real – there was a bump on the head that could explain much. This is an interesting book and like many interesting books it can be read on many levels.

It is an anti-war story that is both confronting and stunningly well written. I really loved the time travel sequences – how the...more I've only just finished this, literally minutes ago - look I had no idea this was going to be nearly so good. When he died last year I read some of his short stories, which were okay, but nothing to write home about. This was something else.

A friend of mine I don't talk to any more by a strange form of mutual agreement / obligation (though, now I’ve worked out how this all works, perhaps we’ve found an alternative means of one way communication?) – was thinking of starting up a science fiction reading group for people who don’t read science fiction. Now, this is exactly the sort of book that would be great for that.

What I liked most about it was that the aliens did not have to be real – there was a bump on the head that could explain much. This is an interesting book and like many interesting books it can be read on many levels.

It is an anti-war story that is both confronting and stunningly well written. I really loved the time travel sequences – how the novel told itself in much the same way that it wanted to explain what fourth dimensional living would be like. The structure of the story is very interesting – brilliantly clever. There is also a lot of very black humour – my favourite kind.

Every time someone dies in the book – and it is about (in part) the bombing of Dresden, so there are plenty of opportunities for people to die – the narrator says, “so it goes”. If you had asked me before reading this if I would have thought this would work as a device I would have said that it definitely would not – that soon it would be a pain in the bum. But I would have been wrong. It was inspired – catching me in much the same way every time and making the deaths more ‘real’ each time. Even when I knew they were coming their iteration was a mantra and one that worked for me in that it did focus my attention. This, even though the stated intention was to do the opposite.

There is, of course, a logical flaw in the aliens seeing all times but making the same mistakes every time which isn’t really covered over by saying all times need to correspond to their inherent structure – but this is a novel and this was not a flaw that annoyed me enough to stop me reading.

This is a humorous book, it is a book that stops you reading and makes you think of the implications of what you are reading. It is a book that is not seeking bland ‘realism’ – at no time is the reader unaware that this is art, rather than ‘life’ (whatever that is) – but this is its power – this is what takes the breath away. What is artifice comments on the real and shows it to as again as new.

I really had not expected this book to be nearly as good as it was. It is one of those books I’ve always known was there, but thought it would be just another science fiction novel. This is anything but ‘just’ anything. A remarkable book I might force my daughters to read.
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