Product Description

Told with deadpan humour and bitter irony, Kurt Vonnegut's cult tale of global destruction preys on our deepest fears of witnessing Armageddon and, worse still, surviving it ... Dr Felix Hoenikker, one of the founding 'fathers' of the atomic bomb, has left a deadly legacy to the world. For he is the inventor of 'ice-nine', a lethal chemical capable of freezing the entire planet. The search for its whereabouts leads to Hoenikker's three ecentric children, to a crazed dictator in the Caribbean, to madness. Felix Hoenikker's Death Wish comes true when his last, fatal gift to mankind brings about the end, that for all of us, is nigh ...

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5177 in Books
• Published on: 2008-05-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 224 pages

About the Author
Kurt Vonnegut was born in Indianapolis in 1922. During the Second World War he was a prisoner in Germany and present at the bombing of Dresden, an experience he recounted in his famous novel Slaughterhouse Five (1969). His first novel, Piano Player, was published in 1951 and since then he has written many novels, including: The Sirens of Titan, Jailbird, Deadeye Dick, Galapagos and Hocus Pocus. Kurt Vonnegut died in April 2007. Benjamin Kunkel (born in 1972 in Colorado) is an American novelist. He co-founded and is a co-editor of the journal n+1. His first novel, Indecision, was published in 2005.

Customer Reviews

'No damn cat, and no damn cradle.'
Lacks the inherant pathos and humour of Slaughterhouse-5 but, don't let that put you off! This is a superbly imaginitative story that incorporates a brilliantly biting, satirical sideswipe at the cynicism of religion, the dangerous nihilism of science and the abundant stupidity of both!

The protaginist is a writer who, whilst investigating the life of Dr Felix Hoenikker (co-creator of the Atomic Bomb), becomes aware of the deadly Ice-09, a 'lethal chemical capable of freezing the entire planet'.

I won't spoil the plot, suffice it to say that, the bulk of the story involves the writer's pursuit and eventual, catastrophic encounter with the deadly chemical.

Vonnegut keeps the story moving along at a comfortable pace, in short chapters, whilst we are introduced to some of the most colourful characters in 20th Century fiction, from seemingly amoral 'mad' scientists to cynical pseudo-messiahs.

I loved the witty dialogue of the Hoenikkers and, the cynical aphorisms of 'Bokonon'. I also liked the way that Vonnegut portrayed his message that, religion is based upon (supposedly harmless) untruths that allegedly, explain the issues that elude science (the unexplainable).

Just buy it!

Marvellous, funny, intelligent, perceptive
Along with Edmund Cooper's "The Overman Culture", one of the science fiction books I remember reading most avidly as a child, books which stay with you throughout your life. "Cat's Cradle", for me, is Vonnegut's best. It doesn't have the nightmare resonance of "Slaughterhouse Five", the cosmic jokes of "Sirens of Titan" or the deep, abiding humanism which suffuses "Breakfast Of Champions", surely Vonnegut's most moving work (positively heartbreaking), but "Cradle" is a magnificent achievement, a book you will return to time and again and always find something new and interesting (and funny!).

Vonnegut topples his targets like bowling pins. The self-consciously epic sweep of the narrative is signalled by its cheeky references to Moby Dick -- "Call me Jonah" is the first line, and there are a massive 127 chapters crammed into its tiny 179 pages -- but what could be more epic than the end of the world anyway? Vonnegut not only thinks up a new and unusual method of destroying the planet, he invents a cynical new religion, a cast of extraordinary characters, and a very human and very flawed narrator. There's love, sex, death, high farce and the meeting of souls.

"Cat's Cradle"'s abiding popularity can be demonstrated by the number of words and phrases which are now part of everyday language - "busy busy busy", ice nine, boko-maru, foma, karass and so on. Genius is an overused word, but this is clearly the work of genius. It may just seem to you like a book full of cruel jokes in which ultimately everybody dies, but that's the world we live in. The central conceit of the invented religion Bokononism is that its followers know it's all rubbish. Worshipping Bokononism is like reading a good novel. "Don't try," Vonnegut tells us about life on page 115. "Just pretend you understand." These are words to live by. You won't regret buying this book.

Make sure you've read Slaughterhouse 5 first
This is the second book of Vonnegut I've read, the first one being Vonnegut's best know novel, "Slaughterhouse 5". If it was not for "Slaughterhouse 5" I would take "A cat's cradle" as a very imaginative, weird and funny book, but probably not one that keeps me thinking for some time once finished. The tone is just too light and the story too improbable to be taken otherwise. But this is highly deceptive and once you realise that Vonnegut's war experience in Dresden has been central to his vision of life, this book appears not just as light entertainment but as a more profound reflection on the meaning of life (pretty meaningless in the author's view I gather) and, incidentally, on the role of religion and the power science gives to some very irresponsible and unbalanced people (this book was written during the cold war and the possibility of the world being completely wiped out by nuclear war was then seen as very real).

The message may be too pessimistic to make the novel completely enjoyable but it makes for an interesting and very funny read until someone presses the wrong the button.