Despite the various national legends regarding World War II, it was not black and white.
Kurt Vonnegut is a veteran of the Second World War. Taken as a prisoner of war (POW) to Dresden, he lived through the harrowing experience of the Allies firebombing the city he was interned in. This book, Slaughterhouse-Five (or The Children's Crusade: A Duty-Dance With Death), mostly follows the journey of Billy Pilgrim, an optometrist that is woefully out of his depth in the war, in a journey that very closely reflects Vonnegut's own experiences.
The story opens with a fourth-wall break, where Vonnegut retells his experience of actually writing his 'famous book about Dresden'. The story then cuts to various experiences throughout starring the American soldier named Billy Pilgrim, a pitiful man that most people describe as 'hardly a soldier'. The story is unique in that Billy Pilgrim travels through time in a sort of dementia-like experience thanks to the efforts of the so-called Tralfmadorians, an alien species that does not experience time linearly.
Overall, this story is one of the best anti-war books ever written. Its style of storytelling reflects the horrifying realities of war quite well.
I would consider this book a must-read for anyone even vaguely interested in historical fiction; it's overall a fantastic look and a more nuanced view on the atrocities in World War II; I would rate this book a 5/5.
留言