“Timequake”
by Kurt Vonnegut
Published: January 2002
ISBN: 0425164349

(Updated: July 2, 2006.)

From the back cover…

At 2:27 p.m. on February 13th of the year 2001, the Universe suffered a crisis in self-confidence. Should it go on expanding indefinitely? What was the point?

I love this book.

I don’t know where and how to begin describing why.

Having been a fan of Mr. Vonnegut’s writing since the time he was still “Jr.”, I have definitely become a fan of Mr. Vonnegut himself over the years. An odd thing to write never having met the man, but if you know his writing, if you have followed his work, if you have read this book you will know why I feel as though I can write this.

I was first introduced to Mr. Vonnegut-then-Jr.’s writing when I was 16, 32 years ago. The book was Cat’s Cradle and it was part of an amazing “Satire” English class in high school. Perhaps because of the context, perhaps because it wasn’t part of the “Science Fiction” English class that I also could have taken but didn’t, perhaps because of some recognition in the writing, I have never bothered (or accepted) classifications of Mr. Vonnegut’s work.

His writing is satirical, real, lyrical, wise, funny, tugging, sometimes ripping, always oh so true. Science is usually part of it. Fiction is usually part of it. But it is not science fiction.

Using fact and fiction to deliver “tellings”, to stir complacency up and into responsibility, to put the same things together differently making the whole of it “new”, to examine things as they are around us and as they are us — be they past, present or future — is Vonnegut’s brilliance.

Timequake is a mixture of fact and fiction, a perfect mixture of fact and fiction that is a glimpse into some of the ponderances, hopes, horrors, life of a man in his 80’s who has shared some of his ponderances, hopes, horrors, life for the majority of his 80 years. Mr. Vonnegut’s “themes” have remained the same over the years — the connection and relationship of science, technology, humanity, human-ness, family, shared experience, writing — and over the same years he has managed to clarify, simplify, express the oh so profound value, pleasure, horror of being human, of being human in society to the point where the important “stuff” can be expressed in a few phrases.

Truly.

Such a generous sharing. Such a pleasurable sharing even if or exactly because everything that is being shared isn’t necessarily a pleasure. Those things that are though, really are or are really too.

Mr. Vonnegut, I will so sorely miss you when you are gone. You have made my life better. Our “meeting” was exactly right each time we met. I know that we will meet again.