This book always seems to be among the favorites of sci-fi and literature readers alike. So, naturally I have to read it. And man-oh-man is it packed with story elements from sad to darkly humorous and from historical to fantastical. It’s a lot to unpack. So it goes.
Slaughterhouse-Five
Author: Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
Pages: 275
Format: Paperback
Originally Published: March 31, 1969
Publisher: Dial Press
View on Goodreads
Date Completed: June 5, 2024
My rating: 
Thoughts
I really didn’t know what to expect when I started reading this book. I knew that it focused on a character called Billy Pilgrim who becomes “unstuck” in time – basically experiencing life non-linearly.
As an optometry student, Billy is drafted into the US Army in World War II. He and others are taken as a prisoner of war and held with others in a slaughterhouse (the fifth one) in Dresden. One of the POWs he marches with is Roland Weary. Roland doesn’t do too well on this march or in the slaughterhouse. In his mind, this has to do with Billy’s incompetence and Roland having to push Billy along. When Roland ultimately dies, he tells another prisoner, Paul Lazzaro, that Billy is responsible for his decline and death. Paul vows to kill Billy someday.
When Dresden is bombed, Billy survives and heads home. He gets married, has kids, survives a plane crash… the usual.
Oh, and he gets abducted by aliens. The Tralfamadorians. He’s put into a zoo of sorts with a famous female movie star. You know, so they can, uh, make nice with each other.
The Tralfamadorians educate Billy on their concept of time. Basically, everything that has happened, is happening, and will happen, all happens at the same time. (Say “happen” one more time…) This allows Billy to become unstuck in time and experience his life non-linearly. But it also allows him to see his own death and accept it “before” it happens.
When you get right down to it, the themes of this book are the destructiveness of war (the senseless bombing of Dresden and the resulting casualties); the nature of time; free will vs. determinism; and mental health issues for veterans – specifically post traumatic stress disorder. Between the war, the bombing, the death of his wife, and I’m sure numerous other things I’m forgetting, Billy essentially has the worst life ever. Viewing his own life non-linearly is his way to trying to make sense of things. However, he becomes pretty defeated, and resigns to life’s tragedies. So it goes.
I gave this book 4 out of 5 stars. It’s a thought-provoking book about war, love and loss, mental health, and how to face death without fear. And there’s aliens.
