- Hardcover: 272 pages
- Publisher: Delacorte Press (Oct 20 2009)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 038534371X
- ISBN-13: 978-0385343718
- Product Dimensions: 14.4 x 2.5 x 21.7 cm
- Shipping Weight: 431 g
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #133,777 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
Review
Look at the Birdie is a collection of fourteen previously unpublished short stories from one of the most original writers in all of American fiction. In this series of perfectly rendered vignettes, written just as he was starting to find his comic voice, Kurt Vonnegut paints a warm, wise, and funny portrait of life in post—World War II America–a world where squabbling couples, high school geniuses, misfit office workers, and small-town lotharios struggle to adapt to changing technology, moral ambiguity, and unprecedented affluence.
Here are tales both cautionary and hopeful, each brimming with Vonnegut’s trademark humor and profound humanism. A family learns the downside of confiding their deepest secrets into a magical invention. A man finds himself in a Kafkaesque world of trouble after he runs afoul of the shady underworld boss who calls the shots in an upstate New York town. A quack psychiatrist turned “murder counselor” concocts a novel new outlet for his paranoid patients. While these stories reflect the anxieties of the postwar era that Vonnegut was so adept at capturing–and provide insight into the development of his early style–collectively, they have a timeless quality that makes them just as relevant today as when they were written. It’s impossible to imagine any of these pieces flowing from the pen of another writer; each in its own way is unmistakably, quintessentially Vonnegut.
Featuring a Foreword by author and longtime Vonnegut confidant Sidney Offit and illustrated with Vonnegut’s characteristically insouciant line drawings, Look at the Birdie is an unexpected gift for readers who thought his unique voice had been stilled forever–and serves as a terrific introduction to his short fiction for anyone who has yet to experience his genius.
Here are tales both cautionary and hopeful, each brimming with Vonnegut’s trademark humor and profound humanism. A family learns the downside of confiding their deepest secrets into a magical invention. A man finds himself in a Kafkaesque world of trouble after he runs afoul of the shady underworld boss who calls the shots in an upstate New York town. A quack psychiatrist turned “murder counselor” concocts a novel new outlet for his paranoid patients. While these stories reflect the anxieties of the postwar era that Vonnegut was so adept at capturing–and provide insight into the development of his early style–collectively, they have a timeless quality that makes them just as relevant today as when they were written. It’s impossible to imagine any of these pieces flowing from the pen of another writer; each in its own way is unmistakably, quintessentially Vonnegut.
Featuring a Foreword by author and longtime Vonnegut confidant Sidney Offit and illustrated with Vonnegut’s characteristically insouciant line drawings, Look at the Birdie is an unexpected gift for readers who thought his unique voice had been stilled forever–and serves as a terrific introduction to his short fiction for anyone who has yet to experience his genius.
Product Description
Look at the Birdie is a collection of fourteen previously unpublished short stories from one of the most original writers in all of American fiction. In this series of perfectly rendered vignettes, written just as he was starting to find his comic voice, Kurt Vonnegut paints a warm, wise, and funny portrait of life in post—World War II America–a world where squabbling couples, high school geniuses, misfit office workers, and small-town lotharios struggle to adapt to changing technology, moral ambiguity, and unprecedented affluence.
Here are tales both cautionary and hopeful, each brimming with Vonnegut's trademark humor and profound humanism. A family learns the downside of confiding their deepest secrets into a magical invention. A man finds himself in a Kafkaesque world of trouble after he runs afoul of the shady underworld boss who calls the shots in an upstate New York town. A quack psychiatrist turned "murder counselor" concocts a novel new outlet for his paranoid patients. While these stories reflect the anxieties of the postwar era that Vonnegut was so adept at capturing– and provide insight into the development of his early style–collectively, they have a timeless quality that makes them just as relevant today as when they were written. It's impossible to imagine any of these pieces flowing from the pen of another writer; each in its own way is unmistakably, quintessentially Vonnegut.
Featuring a Foreword by author and longtime Vonnegut confidant Sidney Offit and illustrated with Vonnegut' s characteristically insouciant line drawings, Look at the Birdie is an unexpected gift for readers who thought his unique voice had been stilled forever–and serves as a terrific introduction to his short fiction for anyone who has yet to experience his genius.
Read "Hello, Red" and "The Petrified Ants," two of the stories from the collection, as single-story e-books before Look at the Birdie goes on sale. Available wherever e-books are sold.
Here are tales both cautionary and hopeful, each brimming with Vonnegut's trademark humor and profound humanism. A family learns the downside of confiding their deepest secrets into a magical invention. A man finds himself in a Kafkaesque world of trouble after he runs afoul of the shady underworld boss who calls the shots in an upstate New York town. A quack psychiatrist turned "murder counselor" concocts a novel new outlet for his paranoid patients. While these stories reflect the anxieties of the postwar era that Vonnegut was so adept at capturing– and provide insight into the development of his early style–collectively, they have a timeless quality that makes them just as relevant today as when they were written. It's impossible to imagine any of these pieces flowing from the pen of another writer; each in its own way is unmistakably, quintessentially Vonnegut.
Featuring a Foreword by author and longtime Vonnegut confidant Sidney Offit and illustrated with Vonnegut' s characteristically insouciant line drawings, Look at the Birdie is an unexpected gift for readers who thought his unique voice had been stilled forever–and serves as a terrific introduction to his short fiction for anyone who has yet to experience his genius.
Read "Hello, Red" and "The Petrified Ants," two of the stories from the collection, as single-story e-books before Look at the Birdie goes on sale. Available wherever e-books are sold.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
4.6 out of 5 stars (17 customer reviews)
20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Worthy Addition - Delight for Vonnegut fans!, Oct 21 2009
By javajunki "javajunki" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Look at the Birdie: Unpublished Short Fiction (Hardcover)
This newly published collection of Kurt Vonnegut short "stories" is a worthy addition to your personal library and a delight for fans - especially those that enjoy reading the full breadth of his writing style. While some of the selections display the quick wit with a twist so common to his more popular works, others border on the bizarre...of course, each has the element of surprise that only Vonnegut does so well.
Contents include:
Confido
FUBAR
Shout About it from the Housetops
A Song for Selma
Hall of Mirrors
The Nice Little People
Hello, Red
Little Drops of Water
The Petrified Ants
The book is hardcover with dustjacket and contains just over 200 pages of pure pleasure reading...the type that makes literature worth the time and effort to slow down, read and reflect upon. Unlike authors of the past, Vonnegut reflects modern society and is often compared to the likes of Twain etc... with an up-to-date appeal that makes it relevant yet refreshing.
Very enjoyable - superb gift idea for Vonnegut fans!
12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Don't be sentimental, Dec 29 2009
By dennisqdw - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Look at the Birdie: Unpublished Short Fiction (Hardcover)
Like the other reviewers I was overjoyed for an opportunity to have something new (and old) to read by the master. These stories are well written, sweet, often surprising and relatively wholesome compared to later work. They also very much reflect a much more innocent era. I would certainly recommend this book to anyone who has read Vonnegut's other work. However, let's keep this in perspective. If we save 5 stars for his masterpieces like Cat's Cradle, and maybe four for somewhat lesser books, then we have to be honest and give this one a 3.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
I hope there's more left, Oct 26 2009
By J. Edgar Mihelic "Iconoclast" - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Look at the Birdie: Unpublished Short Fiction (Hardcover)
Much better than the last two bits of material. These are stories from the front end of his climb to becoming the best American writer since Twain. The other stuff I'd heard before but read greedily like a man thirsting for his last breath. While these stories don't equal his best known works, they are worth the time of someone who has idolized the man and his writing. But if that is true, you probably aren't reading this. Give it a whirl, what have you got to lose?
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