Book Review: Galapagos by Kurt Vonnegut

Book Title: Galapagos

Author: Kurt Vonnegut (http://www.vonnegut.com/)

Pages: 295

Publisher: Doubleday
Genre: Fiction

(Scale Explanation: 1) Meaning awful, 5) Meaning not good, but not bad, equal, 10) Meaning wonderful)

PLOT - 9

CHARACTERS - 9

BEGINNING - 7

ENDING - 8

FLOW - 7

OVERALL - 8

What I liked about this book: This book was the starter of my Vonnegut reading crusade. Although the ending wasn't the best ending to a book that I have ever read, it drew me into Vonnegut's writing. The whole way that this book is written creates a different kind of flow than what 'normal' readers would want. It's slightly choppy, yet completely characteristic to Vonnegut's work. He ends up telling you all about his characters at different points of the book, there is no information dump. I liked how you get a few details throughout the book here and there about what has happened to the human race and how he gives you little foreshadowing details about each characters coming actions. I was very intrigued with Vonnegut's writing from reading this book.

What I disliked about this book: The only thing that I would say that disliked about this book was the choppiness, but some people like that, as I have grown to like that by reading other Vonnegut books. He gives choppy writing a sense of organization that I have never seen done by any other author ever to have existed. It's wonderfully organized chaos.

Who I would recommend this book to: Anyone who is a fan of Vonnegut's writing or wants to get a feel for different styles of writing.

What I felt the book was about: Basically, I understood that this book was being written by a man who was a ghost a million years into the future from 1986. The narrator briefly explains his life from time to time so that you get a feel for him, but he also explains each characters lives and what their lives will become as the book proceeds. The narrator has seen what caused the human apocalypse and explains what happened to humanity in the course of that million years that he has been waiting for Heaven to open up and allow him to enter for the last time. Apparently, humanity has taken a turn for the life of a water dweller seeing as how the narrator explains certain aspects of human nature in the end of his term of living as a ghost on earth. The big part of the Galapagos in this book is to say that the group of humans that were set to go on the 'Nature Cruise of the Century,' a tour of the Galapagos islands on a boat, these humans had to escape the chaos that was beginning on the main continent of South America. Unfortunately, they ended up being stranded on one of the Galapagos Islands where they became the founders of the new humans that came to live on the Galapagos Islands. It was a very strange work of fiction, but I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Favorite/Hated excerpts or quotes from the book: I was unable to choose my favorite before I had to check the book back into the library, but I will update as soon as I get it back.



Thank you!