Title: God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater
Author: Kurt Vonnegut
Type: Fiction
Page Count/Review Word Count: 224
Rating: 9/10
This was the first Kurt Vonnegut novel that I ever read, and it really messed with my mind – every time I felt like I knew what was happening, the metaphorical rug was pulled from under my feet and everything changed again. And yet, it did also stay true to the central idea – the psychological differences between the rich and the poor, and the definition of insanity, as it’s imposed upon us.
For me, it was the sort of book that makes you constantly think, and that’s got to be a good thing. It’s also got me excited about reading more Vonnegut, and it’s not like this is one of his most well-known works – this just happens to be the one that my friend Amanda managed to find going second hand, and the first of the two books that she gave to me that I got round to reading.
The style here was like a cross between Graham Greene, Ernest Hemingway, Jack Kerouac, and Hunter S. Thompson, only the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. I’d recommend the hell out of this one, but then I have no baseline to compare it to. Maybe Vonnegut is consistent!