Most critics regard Vonnegut's early work, specifically Mother Night (1961), Cat's Cradle (1963; see separate entry), and Slaughterhouse-Five (1969; see separate entry) as his best, and subsequent works are always compared to those benchmark novels. As early as The Sirens of Titan (1959), Vonnegut established an antinovel form and antinovel techniques which he has used ever since: a main character or first person narrator who ranges back and forth in time, nightmarish and bloody events which overwhelm the characters, antinovelistic interrupters that break up the action and narration, and a whimsical or pseudoscientific view of the purpose of existence (in Deadeye Dick, when one is born a peephole opens; when one dies, it closes). How one responds to Vonnegut's later novels depends on whether one accepts and enjoys this form.

From the beginning of his career, Vonnegut has enjoyed plugging the same characters in and out of his books. Rabo...