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A review by nssutton
And So it Goes: Kurt Vonnegut: A Life by Charles J. Shields
4.0
Vonnegut is one of those authors who I hold in such high esteem that I was terrified of what I might learn in this book. Seuss and Schultz were ruined for me in their biographies, but Shields does a fine job of telling the facts without vilifying or drawing too much attention to martial indiscretions. I like the flow, and interspersing of book summary and typical biography fare for the reader to see the large disconnect between what Vonnegut wrote and what he lived.
That disconnect was the biggest surprise to me, as I consider God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, to be the very marrow of my bones. Similarly, I fell into a research wormhole upon learning Vonnegut's brother died on a Newark-Bayonne railway that I never knew existed. Also, I never made the connection between Kurt's Jill and the Jill who shot A Very Young Dancer, a book that has haunted my entire librarian career.
Although I have less of a personal connection, I'd really like to read Shield's biography of Harper Lee now that I've finished this one. I lugged it around for weeks, forever letting my new iPad eclipse it. Vonnegut would have been horrified, but so it goes.
That disconnect was the biggest surprise to me, as I consider God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, to be the very marrow of my bones. Similarly, I fell into a research wormhole upon learning Vonnegut's brother died on a Newark-Bayonne railway that I never knew existed. Also, I never made the connection between Kurt's Jill and the Jill who shot A Very Young Dancer, a book that has haunted my entire librarian career.
Although I have less of a personal connection, I'd really like to read Shield's biography of Harper Lee now that I've finished this one. I lugged it around for weeks, forever letting my new iPad eclipse it. Vonnegut would have been horrified, but so it goes.