Slaughterhouse Five was the first book not including textbooks that I have read cover to cover in quite a while. Although most of the time it seemed strange and jumped all over the place I couldn't put it down. Oddly enough I think that’s exactly what kept me reading. I was constantly wondering what was going to happen next or how the entire story would tie together at the end. So much of the appeal of the book for me was its unconvential sequence of events.
I’ll admit I was a little disappointed when I reached the end of the book and still felt like it had made no conclusive ending. The bombing had happened but I was still waiting for a more obvious moral message from Vonnegut about the massacre. One thing I enjoyed about the constant switching back and forth between events in Billy life was how it put life events into perspective. Billy was successful and wealthy by most people’s standards but his experiences in the war and on the planet Tralfamadore gave him a much different perspective on the rest of his life.
Another interesting theme in the story was the lack of free will. This was definitely illustrated through Billy. Throughout the entire story he just went along with whatever was happening to him and did what he was told whether he was being commanded by Germans or aliens. I would imagine this is how it feels to fight in a war, especially if you had been drafted into it against your will.
For as strange as it is, Slaughterhouse Five does a great job of accomplishing what it sets out to do. Before I read the book I had never heard about the fire-bombing of Dresden and now I have; and I now believe the bombing was senseless just like the book was seemingly senseless.
