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Cat's Cradle cover art

Cat's Cradle

By: Kurt Vonnegut
Narrated by: Tony Roberts
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Summary

Cat's Cradle is Vonnegut's satirical commentary on modern man and his madness. An apocalyptic tale of this planet's ultimate fate, it features a little person as the protagonist; a complete, original theology created by a calypso singer; and a vision of the future that is at once blackly fatalistic and hilariously funny.

©1963 Kurt Vonnegut, Jr (P)2007 HarperCollins Publishers

What listeners say about Cat's Cradle

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Laughter and Despair

Vonnegut makes me laugh. The world he creates is ridiculous, but equally it has all the foibles and cruelty of the real world. For fun, and to add to the despair there is the religion of Bokononism. A religion that is hypocritical, false and cruel. A religion that offers some sense of acceptance of life, but only if we accept that it's falseness is the only solution to the madness that men perpetrate. The Cat's Cradle is the metaphor for the world of the book; playful, complex; a trick.The reading of the audiobook is not too cynical and not too flat; just right.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Excellent introduction to the short american novel

I don't have much exposure to American literature but this was the start of a love affair with the short novel. Vonnegut has a great way of getting to the point, making subtle points about human nature and he seems to be obsessed by fate. It seriously expanded my choice of books.

If you like your stories rooted in reality, then this one might not be for you but otherwise there's humanity in this story and a plot that holds you attention. A great book.

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6 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    2 out of 5 stars

Great dialogue

I had great trouble understanding what was actually going on in terms of story or what the point was. Weirdly though I enjoyed it more once I stopped trying to understand it. The narration and dialogue was superbly engaging and darkly comedic. The story, I have no idea.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

A bit self-indulgent.

I might have enjoyed it more if had read the physical book. I found the audio tricky to follow at one point and feel like I missed a bit in the middle.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

I expected more

it's a decent audiobook, narrator is decent but.
I compare the story with catch 22 hence a bit disappointed, the style is poorer but the book compensate with the absurdity of the story.

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3 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Cat's Cradle - that pleasure is mine

Having only read Breakfast of Champions previously I am a newcomer to Voneguts writing, but having had this book recommended from a number of quality sources I decided it was time to branch out!
A very satisfying rendition of a superb piece of writing.
I am considering converting to Bokononism, because the Bokononist foma is better than the foma of the other religions...
The short interview with Kurt Vonegut at the end is a nice way to cap off the experience too :)

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2 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Vonnegut is in a class by himself

this is wonderful - the writing is so far beyond standard sci fi fare it's embarrassing. the story is deceptively simple, and as ever the ideas and conceits are exactly where they need to be - driving there sorry, not dominating it.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Inspirational

To maintain my capacity to reread and perpetually reexamine life in the Socratic way my own existence along with lifelong literary learning at my age, is a most comforting experience. I myself having lived through the immense changes of the 20th century and now two decades into this new millennium, of which I, this sentient being, have witnessed, observed and thankfully not lost, the immense memory or interest that mankind and womankind are sadly and collectively losing the hold of through the inception of this so-called "progress of intelligence" by way of technology and science, which is, in my own humble opinion the recapitulation of failure, the ability to think and not be fooled into the collective innocently ignorant popular consensus?.
When will humanity stop and think collectively? Is it a perpetually incomplete trait that sentient beings may never address? Will there be no understanding of our own perpetual innocent ignorance that which only a few thinkers are capable of achieving?
Sadly I say that one sumises humanity is 'losing' the ability to inculcate safely and humanely and without prejudice a for or against collective understanding that no one knows anything and will never do so.
Most innocence moves through the fog of power, science and religion, the foundations of all ignorance, baseless and perpetually built and destroyed and rebuilt and yet still one witnesses that it remains in all innocence, perpetual.
To be continued...... Tom O'Rourke..1953 ?.... love always

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
  • GP
  • 08-01-21

Not for me

It's obviously done well for a reason, people see a deeper meaning maybe, people can see themselves or the world in it, or maybe its just something else that I completely missed that would have made me enjoy it.

I feel the story was plain with nothing great to mention happening in any of it.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Very well read book.

The reader's sardonic tone perfectly fits this classic novel. This was a very enjoyable listen.

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1 person found this helpful