Easily the best Vonnegut I've read, but this only brings all of my conflicting thoughts about Vonnegut to the fore.

Vonnegut is deeply influenced by Louis-Ferdinand Céline, and he is very honest about his influence. I think both authors saw the fundamental limitations of writing. Neither mystified the power of art. The absurdity of writing about something as terrible and real about war... Why? To what end? It really is insane, like trying to dance a debt away. So it's neither an anti- or pro- war novel as people love arguing; part of the worldview of the novel is that this is not a property of novels. It's like being pro- or anti- weather. It is what it is!

It's an incredibly painful novel. The scene with Billy getting stomped by Roland Weary, threatening the precious wires that run up and down his spine, brought me to literal tears, and I had to put it down for a bit. The quick cuts to Billy Pilgrim in his suburban terrarium are effective at placing both worlds in equal footing. There are many reminders that Dresden and Indiana exist in the same place.

This brings us to the sci-fi elements of the novel. In a way it captures something I had never connected before, which is the brutality of the war served as a kind of wellspring for the sci-fi of the mid-twentieth century. It's an interesting idea which feels right. The less generous way to read the Tralfamadorians is as Vonnegut feeling the need to make the ideas about contemporaneity and time more explicit. I would not consider this reading if not for Vonnegut using similar tricks in, for example, Breakfast of Champions. I think Vonnegut often "overexplains."

The last issue is that of Schmalz. This staring into the void and face-to-face with absurdity brings you to a dead end and breeds a sort of insanity. With Céline it led to fascism and anti-semitism... Not good! With Vonnegut it leads to a sort of idiocy, a self-lobotomy—"God damn it, you've got to be kind." It's the both the price you pay for the staring into the abyss and evidence that you did. Oh well, so it goes.